Julian Dutton
Encyclopedia
Julian Dutton is an English
comedy writer and performer, principally for television and radio, whose work has won a British Comedy Award and a BAFTA.
Described as one of "the best vocal performers around," (BBC Comedy) he was one of the driving forces behind the hit BBC One
comedy show The Big Impression with Alistair McGowan
, and has also written and starred in several of his own series on BBC Radio 4
, as well as writing extensively for many other TV and radio shows. His series Truly, Madly, Bletchley
was described by The Independent on Sunday as "The most confident new sitcom since The Navy Lark
", and Time Out praised his series The Harpoon
, written with Peter Baynham
, as having achieved "classic status."
His children's sitcom Scoop for CBBC
, which Dutton writes and performs in, is now in its third series - series 3 being screened in 2011 - and the hit impressions show "The Secret World," written with Bill Dare
, in which Dutton performs alongside star impressionists Jon Culshaw
, Lewis Macleod
, Duncan Wisbey
and Jess Robinson
, had its second series broadcast in the Autumn of 2010. The show was described by the Daily Express
as "...definitely the funniest show on R4 for a long time."
He is the author of the historical travelogue "Shakespeare's Journey Home: a Traveller's Guide through Elizabethan England."
http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00583ZPGI
, Dutton grew up in Marlow, Buckinghamshire
, attending Great Marlow School
. Fellow pupils included Olympic Champion Steve Redgrave
, the future internet entrepreneur John Wilmott and the painter Paul Wilmott.
Like Alistair McGowan, Dutton attended the University of Leeds
where he studied English and History, whilst performing extensively with the University Theatre Group. After leaving university he began work as an actor, touring with his own theatre company and writing and performing in his own play The Candidate at the New End Theatre
, Hampstead
.
Early professional work included touring working men's clubs in the Midlands and North of England with a children's variety show; appearances in the West End with Charlton Heston
and Ben Cross
in The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial; and a national tour with Ralph Bates
in Alan Ayckbourn
's Absent Friends
.
Dutton then aged several decades to portray 'Morganhall', the eccentric barrister in
John Mortimer
's comic two-hander The Dock Brief, performed with Canadian actor Jonathan Hartman.
He also toured Europe in productions of The Taming of the Shrew
and The Importance of Being Earnest
, appearing in Rotterdam, Cologne, Antwerp and Amsterdam; as well as TV appearances in Tucker's Luck
, The Bill
, Dempsey & Makepeace
and Rockliffe's Babies
.
on the stand-up circuit in London, and at this time began writing comedy shows for BBC Radio, including Week Ending
which he worked on with Peter Baynham, Richard Herring
, Stewart Lee
, Harry Hill
, Ben Moor, Armando Ianucci, Harry Thompson
, and Sarah Smith; and The News Huddlines
, Roy Hudd
's weekly topical sketch show. As well as performing cabaret on the club circuit, from 1991 to 1997 he wrote more than eighty half-hour radio comedy shows, including The Harpoon
, the latter jointly with Peter Baynham and starring himself with Alistair McGowan, Peter Baynham, Susie Brann and Mary Elliot-Nelson. Three series of The Harpoon were broadcast, plus two Christmas specials, all produced by Sarah Smith, from 1991 to 1993. During this time Dutton also dramatised and performed in six P. G. Wodehouse
stories for BBC Radio 4, Ukridge, in which Griff Rhys Jones
played the eponymous anti-hero, starring alongside Robert Bathurst
.
The following year, in 1994, he was given his own series, Truly, Madly, Bletchley
,
which he wrote and starred in, along with David Battley, Liz Fraser
, Simon Godley and Toby Longworth
. Truly, Madly, Bletchley, produced by Dirk Maggs
, was the first sketch show in the history of radio comedy to have been written by one person - apart from Harry Hill's Fruit Corner, which was being broadcast at the same time and which Dutton also performed in.
As a result of his radio work Dutton won the Peter Titheridge Award for Radio Comedy Writing, along with Richard Herring and Stewart Lee. At this period he was touring widely as a stand-up comedian, supporting Harry Hill in the West End, and performing with Al Murray
, Jim Tavare
and Jenny Eclair.
and John Sessions
, Time Gentlemen Please
, Al Murray's sitcom for Sky
, and Does China Exist?, performing with Paul Merton
. Dutton was also cast in many TV commercials, including playing the new Secret Lemonade Drinker in adverts with Ronnie Corbett
, Frankie Howerd
, and John McEnroe
. He was also cast as the Canon Man in the copier ads.
In 2000 he co-created, wrote and performed in Alistair McGowan's Big Impression, later to be renamed The Big Impression, which was BBC One's first sketch show for many years and their first impressions show since Mike Yarwood
's. The show, produced by Charlie Hanson
, proved a massive hit: in addition to writing the series Dutton was one of the supporting performers along with Ronni Ancona
, Alan Francis, Roger Blake and Duncan Wisbey
, and performed impressions of, among others, Dustin Hoffman
, John Le Mesurier
and James Stewart
. He wrote and performed in four series of the show and two Christmas Specials, and won a British Comedy Award in 2001, and a BAFTA. A spin-off series, Ronni Ancona & Co
was commissioned in 2007, which Dutton wrote with Ancona, Alan Francis and Alex Lowe
.
Dutton also writes extensively for children's television, including the sketch shows Spoof and Driving Me Mad, the long-running legendary sitcom ChuckleVision
, and the 13-part sitcom Scoop
, re-commissioned for a second series of 13 episodes for screening in 2010, and a third series for screening in 2011. Dutton was also commissioned to create and write a pilot for a new CBBC sitcom, Little Chucks, the adventures of Paul and Barry Chuckle
as children, broadcast in 2010.
Recent television appearances include the Emmy Award
-nominated My Life as a Popat
for ITV
, The Sarah Jane Adventures
, a Doctor Who
spin-off for CBBC
produced by Russell T Davies, Nuzzle and Scratch
, a children's comedy series, and Scoop with Shaun Williamson
.
In 2006/7 he performed a London run of his impressions show Look Back in Hunger, a one-man history of film and TV, and in early 2009 wrote and performed two new radio comedy series, Inside Alan Francis, with fellow comedian and actor Alan Francis, and a new impressions show, The Secret World, produced by Bill Dare
, in which Dutton performs alongside star impressionists Jon Culshaw
, Lewis Macleod
, Duncan Wisbey
and Jess Robinson
. He is also developing a silent comedy TV sketch show, The Dumb Show - a show devoted to purely visual comedy.
A third series of 13 episodes of his children's sitcom Scoop was commissioned and was filmed in the Autumn of 2010 for screening in 2011; and a second series of the hit impressions show "The Secret World" was broadcast on BBC R4 in September 2010.
He has also written columns for The Sunday Times
, The Independent on Sunday, and the London Evening Standard
, and a historical travel book, Shakespeare's Journey Home: a Traveller's Guide through Elizabethan England.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00583ZPGI
, with whom he has two children, Jack and Florence. He lives in the village of Lane End
in the Chiltern hills, Buckinghamshire
.
The News Huddlines
Mackay the New
Flying the Flag
The Christopher Marlowe Mysteries
The Harpoon
Struck Off and Die
Truly, Madly, Bletchley
Harry Hill's Fruit Corner
Gush
Mammon
The Oldest Member
Ukridge
Richard Barton, General Practioner
Inside Alan Francis
The Secret World
Les Kelly’s Britain
Brian Gulliver's Travels
Reception
Dempsey and Makepeace
Rockcliffe's Babies
Tucker's Luck
Friday Night Armistice
Jim Tavare Presents
Does China Exist?
Bore of the Year Awards
Time Gentlemen Please
The Big Impression
Ronni Ancona & Co
My Life as a Popat
Chucklevision
Scoop
The Sarah Jane Adventures
The Stephen K. Amos Show
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
comedy writer and performer, principally for television and radio, whose work has won a British Comedy Award and a BAFTA.
Described as one of "the best vocal performers around," (BBC Comedy) he was one of the driving forces behind the hit BBC One
BBC One
BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service, and was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution...
comedy show The Big Impression with Alistair McGowan
Alistair McGowan
Alistair McGowan is a British impressionist, stand-up comic, actor, singer and writer best known to British audiences for The Big Impression , which was, for four years, one of BBC1's top-rating comedy programmes - winning numerous awards, including a BAFTA in 2003...
, and has also written and starred in several of his own series on BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4 is a British domestic radio station, operated and owned by the BBC, that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. The station controller is currently Gwyneth Williams, and the...
, as well as writing extensively for many other TV and radio shows. His series Truly, Madly, Bletchley
Truly, Madly, Bletchley
Truly, Madly, Bletchley was a BBC Radio 4 comedy series from 1997 written by and starring comedian and impressionist Julian Dutton and produced by Dirk Maggs...
was described by The Independent on Sunday as "The most confident new sitcom since The Navy Lark
The Navy Lark
The Navy Lark was a radio sit-com about life aboard a British Royal Navy frigate named HMS Troutbridge, based in HMNB Portsmouth, though in series 1 and 2 the ship and crew were stationed offshore at an unnamed location known simply as "The Island." In series 2 this island was revealed to be...
", and Time Out praised his series The Harpoon
The Harpoon
The Harpoon was a BBC Radio 4 series broadcast between 1991 and 1994, written by Julian Dutton and Peter Baynham. It consisted of three four part series and two Christmas specials, and was performed by Julian Dutton, Peter Baynham, Susie Brann, Alistair McGowan and Mary Elliott-Nelson, and was...
, written with Peter Baynham
Peter Baynham
Peter Baynham is a screenwriter and a British comedian, writer, and performer. He often collaborates with Armando Iannucci and Chris Morris and has worked with Stewart Lee and Richard Herring. He is first heard on Morris' early radio DJ slots, often going out to places...
, as having achieved "classic status."
His children's sitcom Scoop for CBBC
CBBC
CBBC is one of two brand names used for the BBC's children's television strands. Between 1985 and 2002, CBBC was the name given to all the BBC's programmes on TV for children aged under 14...
, which Dutton writes and performs in, is now in its third series - series 3 being screened in 2011 - and the hit impressions show "The Secret World," written with Bill Dare
Bill Dare
Bill Dare is an English producer and devisor of radio and television comedy programmes.The son of the actor and broadcaster Peter Jones, he is a graduate of the University of Manchester who subsequently became an actor, director and writer...
, in which Dutton performs alongside star impressionists Jon Culshaw
Jon Culshaw
Jonathan Peter Culshaw is an English impressionist and comedian. He was educated at St Bede's RC High School, Ormskirk and St John Rigby College, in Orrell, Wigan....
, Lewis Macleod
Lewis MacLeod
Euan Lewis MacLeod is a prolific Scottish character actor, who can be heard as the voice of a huge number of television commercials, movie trailers and cartoons in his native UK. He voices characters such as Sebulba from Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace and Postman Pat...
, Duncan Wisbey
Duncan Wisbey
Duncan Wisbey is an English actor, musician, writer and impressionist. He is often credited as simply Wisbey.-Recordings and Appearances:...
and Jess Robinson
Jess Robinson
Jess Robinson , is an English up and coming comedy actress and impressionist.Jess started out in theatre and trained at The Arts Educational School, Tring Park as a singer. She played Little Voice in The Rise and Fall of Little Voice, by Jim Cartwright, at the Courtyard Theatre...
, had its second series broadcast in the Autumn of 2010. The show was described by the Daily Express
Daily Express
The Daily Express switched from broadsheet to tabloid in 1977 and was bought by the construction company Trafalgar House in the same year. Its publishing company, Beaverbrook Newspapers, was renamed Express Newspapers...
as "...definitely the funniest show on R4 for a long time."
He is the author of the historical travelogue "Shakespeare's Journey Home: a Traveller's Guide through Elizabethan England."
http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00583ZPGI
Early career
Born in central LondonLondon
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, Dutton grew up in Marlow, Buckinghamshire
Marlow, Buckinghamshire
Marlow is a town and civil parish within Wycombe district in south Buckinghamshire, England...
, attending Great Marlow School
Great Marlow School
Great Marlow School is a co-educational secondary school in Marlow, Buckinghamshire. It takes children from the age of 11 through to the age of 18 and has approximately 1,260 pupils. In August 2011 the school became an Academy. The school is currently undergoing a building project to erect a new...
. Fellow pupils included Olympic Champion Steve Redgrave
Steve Redgrave
Sir Steven Geoffrey Redgrave CBE is an English rower who won gold medals at five consecutive Olympic Games from 1984 to 2000. He has also won three Commonwealth Games gold medals and nine World Rowing Championships gold medals...
, the future internet entrepreneur John Wilmott and the painter Paul Wilmott.
Like Alistair McGowan, Dutton attended the University of Leeds
University of Leeds
The University of Leeds is a British Redbrick university located in the city of Leeds, West Yorkshire, England...
where he studied English and History, whilst performing extensively with the University Theatre Group. After leaving university he began work as an actor, touring with his own theatre company and writing and performing in his own play The Candidate at the New End Theatre
New End Theatre
The New End Theatre, Hampstead, was a 80-seat fringe theatre venue in London, England, located in the London Borough of Camden which operated from 1974 until 2011. It was listed widely on the internet, including with the New York Times....
, Hampstead
Hampstead
Hampstead is an area of London, England, north-west of Charing Cross. Part of the London Borough of Camden in Inner London, it is known for its intellectual, liberal, artistic, musical and literary associations and for Hampstead Heath, a large, hilly expanse of parkland...
.
Early professional work included touring working men's clubs in the Midlands and North of England with a children's variety show; appearances in the West End with Charlton Heston
Charlton Heston
Charlton Heston was an American actor of film, theatre and television. Heston is known for heroic roles in films such as The Ten Commandments, Ben-Hur for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor, El Cid, and Planet of the Apes...
and Ben Cross
Ben Cross
Ben Cross is a British actor of the stage and screen, best known for his portrayal of the British Olympic athlete Harold Abrahams in the 1981 movie Chariots of Fire.-Early life:...
in The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial; and a national tour with Ralph Bates
Ralph Bates
Ralph Bates was an English film and television actor, known for his role in the British sitcom Dear John and for being one of Hammer Horror's best-known actors from the latter period of the company....
in Alan Ayckbourn
Alan Ayckbourn
Sir Alan Ayckbourn CBE is a prolific English playwright. He has written and produced seventy-three full-length plays in Scarborough and London and was, between 1972 and 2009, the artistic director of the Stephen Joseph Theatre in Scarborough, where all but four of his plays have received their...
's Absent Friends
Absent Friends (play)
Absent Friends is a 1974 play by British playwright Alan Ayckbourn.When Colin, a friend who has been absent, comes back to his circle of friends, his friends are worried about how to approach him over the death of his fiancée, Carol . Diana organizes a tea party for Colin's arrival...
.
Dutton then aged several decades to portray 'Morganhall', the eccentric barrister in
John Mortimer
John Mortimer
Sir John Clifford Mortimer, CBE, QC was a British barrister, dramatist, screenwriter and author.-Early life:...
's comic two-hander The Dock Brief, performed with Canadian actor Jonathan Hartman.
He also toured Europe in productions of The Taming of the Shrew
The Taming of the Shrew
The Taming of the Shrew is a comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1590 and 1591.The play begins with a framing device, often referred to as the Induction, in which a mischievous nobleman tricks a drunken tinker named Sly into believing he is actually a nobleman himself...
and The Importance of Being Earnest
The Importance of Being Earnest
The Importance of Being Earnest, A Trivial Comedy for Serious People is a play by Oscar Wilde. First performed on 14 February 1895 at St. James's Theatre in London, it is a farcical comedy in which the protagonists maintain fictitious personae in order to escape burdensome social obligations...
, appearing in Rotterdam, Cologne, Antwerp and Amsterdam; as well as TV appearances in Tucker's Luck
Tucker's Luck
Tucker's Luck was a British television series made by the BBC between 1983 and 1985.The series is a spin-off from the school drama Grange Hill and capitalised on the popularity of one of the series' original characters — Peter "Tucker" Jenkins, played by Todd Carty.Tucker's Luck followed the...
, The Bill
The Bill
The Bill is a police procedural television series that ran from October 1984 to August 2010. It focused on the lives and work of one shift of police officers, rather than on any particular aspect of police work...
, Dempsey & Makepeace
Dempsey & Makepeace
Dempsey & Makepeace is a British television crime drama made by London Weekend Television for ITV, created and produced by Ranald Graham...
and Rockliffe's Babies
Rockliffe's Babies
Rockliffe's Babies was a British television drama produced by the BBC which ran for two series between 1987 and 1988. The series was devised by Richard O`Keeffe and produced by Leonard Lewis. Writers included Richard O`Keeffe, Don Webb, Charlie Humphreys and Nick Perry...
.
Comedy, stand-up & radio
In the early 1990s he turned from the theatre to comedy, performing an impressionist acton the stand-up circuit in London, and at this time began writing comedy shows for BBC Radio, including Week Ending
Week Ending
Week Ending... was a satirical radio current affairs sketch show, first broadcast on BBC Radio 4, usually on Friday evenings. It was devised by writer/producers Simon Brett and David Hatch, and was originally hosted by Nationwide presenter Michael Barratt.The show's title was always announced as...
which he worked on with Peter Baynham, Richard Herring
Richard Herring
Richard Keith Herring is a British comedian and writer, whose early work includes his involvement in the double-act, Lee and Herring...
, Stewart Lee
Stewart Lee
Stewart Lee is an English stand-up comedian, writer and director known for being one half of the 1990s comedy duo Lee and Herring, and for co-writing and directing the critically acclaimed and controversial stage show Jerry Springer - The Opera...
, Harry Hill
Harry Hill
Harry Hill , is a Perrier Award–winning English comedian, author and television presenter. A former medical doctor , Hill began his career in comedy with the popular radio show Harry Hill's Fruit Corner.-Personal life:Hill was born in Woking,...
, Ben Moor, Armando Ianucci, Harry Thompson
Harry Thompson
Harry William Thompson was an English radio and television producer, comedy writer, novelist and biographer....
, and Sarah Smith; and The News Huddlines
The News Huddlines
The News Huddlines was a long-running BBC Radio 2 topical comedy sketch show starring Roy Hudd that ran for fifty one series from 1975 until 2001. Each episode lasted for half an hour and consisted of topical sketches, songs and one-liners.-Performers:...
, Roy Hudd
Roy Hudd
Roy Hudd, OBE is an English comedian, actor, radio host and author, and an authority on the history of music hall entertainment.- Early life :...
's weekly topical sketch show. As well as performing cabaret on the club circuit, from 1991 to 1997 he wrote more than eighty half-hour radio comedy shows, including The Harpoon
The Harpoon
The Harpoon was a BBC Radio 4 series broadcast between 1991 and 1994, written by Julian Dutton and Peter Baynham. It consisted of three four part series and two Christmas specials, and was performed by Julian Dutton, Peter Baynham, Susie Brann, Alistair McGowan and Mary Elliott-Nelson, and was...
, the latter jointly with Peter Baynham and starring himself with Alistair McGowan, Peter Baynham, Susie Brann and Mary Elliot-Nelson. Three series of The Harpoon were broadcast, plus two Christmas specials, all produced by Sarah Smith, from 1991 to 1993. During this time Dutton also dramatised and performed in six P. G. Wodehouse
P. G. Wodehouse
Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, KBE was an English humorist, whose body of work includes novels, short stories, plays, poems, song lyrics, and numerous pieces of journalism. He enjoyed enormous popular success during a career that lasted more than seventy years and his many writings continue to be...
stories for BBC Radio 4, Ukridge, in which Griff Rhys Jones
Griff Rhys Jones
Griffith "Griff" Rhys Jones is a Welsh comedian, writer, actor, television presenter and personality. Jones came to national attention in the early 1980s for his work in the BBC television comedy sketch shows Not the Nine O'Clock News and Alas Smith and Jones along with his comedy partner Mel Smith...
played the eponymous anti-hero, starring alongside Robert Bathurst
Robert Bathurst
Robert Guy Bathurst is an English actor. Bathurst was born in the Gold Coast in 1957, where his father was working as a management consultant. His family moved to Dublin, Ireland, in 1959 and Bathurst was enrolled at an Anglican boarding school...
.
The following year, in 1994, he was given his own series, Truly, Madly, Bletchley
Truly, Madly, Bletchley
Truly, Madly, Bletchley was a BBC Radio 4 comedy series from 1997 written by and starring comedian and impressionist Julian Dutton and produced by Dirk Maggs...
,
which he wrote and starred in, along with David Battley, Liz Fraser
Liz Fraser
Liz Fraser is an English actress, mainly in comedy roles.- Life and career :Her birthdate is usually attributed as 1933, the year she gave when auditioning for her role in I'm All Right Jack, as the Boulting Brothers wanted someone younger for the part...
, Simon Godley and Toby Longworth
Toby Longworth
Toby Longworth is a British actor who has appeared on film, radio and television. He is originally from Somerset, where he attended King Edward's School, Bath...
. Truly, Madly, Bletchley, produced by Dirk Maggs
Dirk Maggs
Dirk Maggs, a freelance writer and director working across all media, is principally known for his work in radio, where he evolved radio drama into "Audio Movies," a near-visual approach combining scripts, layered sound effects, cinematic music and cutting edge technology. He pioneered the use of...
, was the first sketch show in the history of radio comedy to have been written by one person - apart from Harry Hill's Fruit Corner, which was being broadcast at the same time and which Dutton also performed in.
As a result of his radio work Dutton won the Peter Titheridge Award for Radio Comedy Writing, along with Richard Herring and Stewart Lee. At this period he was touring widely as a stand-up comedian, supporting Harry Hill in the West End, and performing with Al Murray
Al Murray
Alastair James Hay "Al" Murray , is a British comedian best known for his stand-up persona, The Pub Landlord, a stereotypical xenophobic public house licensee. In 2003, he was listed in The Observer as one of the 50 funniest acts in British comedy...
, Jim Tavare
Jim Tavare
Jim Tavaré is an English stand-up comedian, actor and musician. He is best known for his work on The Sketch Show on ITV which won a BAFTA award and also plays the role of Tom, the owner of the Leaky Cauldron, in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.-Life and career:Tavaré was born in Essex,...
and Jenny Eclair.
TV comedy
Early TV appearances at this time included The Bore of the Year Awards, in which he appeared in sketches with Peter CookPeter Cook
Peter Edward Cook was an English satirist, writer and comedian. An extremely influential figure in modern British comedy, he is regarded as the leading light of the British satire boom of the 1960s. He has been described by Stephen Fry as "the funniest man who ever drew breath," although Cook's...
and John Sessions
John Sessions
John Gibb Marshall , better known by the stage name John Sessions, is a Scottish actor and comedian. He is known for comedy improvisation in television shows such as Whose Line Is It Anyway?; as a panellist on QI; and as a character actor in numerous films, both in the UK and in Hollywood.-Early...
, Time Gentlemen Please
Time Gentlemen Please
Time Gentlemen Please is a British sitcom. Commissioned by Sky One, it was primarily written by Richard Herring and Al Murray and ran for two series between 2000 and 2002.- Premise and characters :...
, Al Murray's sitcom for Sky
Sky Digital (UK & Ireland)
Sky is the brand name for British Sky Broadcasting's digital satellite television and radio service, transmitted from SES Astra satellites located at 28.2° east and Eutelsat's Eurobird 1 satellite at 28.5°E. The service was originally launched as Sky Digital, distinguishing it from the original...
, and Does China Exist?, performing with Paul Merton
Paul Merton
Paul Merton is a British comedian, writer, actor and television presenter. Known for his improvisation skill, his humour is rooted in deadpan, surreal and sometimes dark comedy...
. Dutton was also cast in many TV commercials, including playing the new Secret Lemonade Drinker in adverts with Ronnie Corbett
Ronnie Corbett
Ronald Balfour "Ronnie" Corbett, OBE is a Scottish actor and comedian of Scottish and English parentage who had a long association with Ronnie Barker in the British television comedy series The Two Ronnies...
, Frankie Howerd
Frankie Howerd
Francis Alick "Frankie" Howerd OBE was an English comedian and comic actor whose career, described by fellow comedian Barry Cryer as "a series of comebacks", spanned six decades.-Early career:...
, and John McEnroe
John McEnroe
John Patrick McEnroe, Jr. is a former world no. 1 professional tennis player from the United States. During his career, he won seven Grand Slam singles titles , nine Grand Slam men's doubles titles, and one Grand Slam mixed doubles title...
. He was also cast as the Canon Man in the copier ads.
In 2000 he co-created, wrote and performed in Alistair McGowan's Big Impression, later to be renamed The Big Impression, which was BBC One's first sketch show for many years and their first impressions show since Mike Yarwood
Mike Yarwood
Mike Yarwood, OBE is an English impressionist and comedian. He was one of Britain's top-rated entertainers, regularly appearing on television from the mid 1960s to the early 1980s. He left Bredbury Secondary Modern School in 1956 and worked as a messenger and then salesman at a garment warehouse...
's. The show, produced by Charlie Hanson
Charlie Hanson
Charlie Hanson is a critically acclaimed British producer and director.Charlie Hanson's work as a producer spans over two decades of television drama and comedy...
, proved a massive hit: in addition to writing the series Dutton was one of the supporting performers along with Ronni Ancona
Ronni Ancona
Ronni Ancona is a Scottish actress, impressionist and author. Ancona won the Best TV Comedy Actress award at the 2003 British Comedy Awards for her work in Big Impression.- Career :...
, Alan Francis, Roger Blake and Duncan Wisbey
Duncan Wisbey
Duncan Wisbey is an English actor, musician, writer and impressionist. He is often credited as simply Wisbey.-Recordings and Appearances:...
, and performed impressions of, among others, Dustin Hoffman
Dustin Hoffman
Dustin Lee Hoffman is an American actor with a career in film, television, and theatre since 1960. He has been known for his versatile portrayals of antiheroes and vulnerable characters....
, John Le Mesurier
John Le Mesurier
John Le Mesurier was a BAFTA Award-winning English actor. He is most famous for his role as Sergeant Arthur Wilson in the popular 1970s BBC comedy Dad's Army.-Career:...
and James Stewart
James Stewart (actor)
James Maitland Stewart was an American film and stage actor, known for his distinctive voice and his everyman persona. Over the course of his career, he starred in many films widely considered classics and was nominated for five Academy Awards, winning one in competition and receiving one Lifetime...
. He wrote and performed in four series of the show and two Christmas Specials, and won a British Comedy Award in 2001, and a BAFTA. A spin-off series, Ronni Ancona & Co
Ronni Ancona & Co
Ronni Ancona & Co is a comedy sketch show that aired on BBC One and began on 25 May 2007. The sketches all consisted of impressions of well-known celebrities amongst other comedy sketches of fictional characters created by Ronni Ancona. Phil Cornwell, Jan Ravens and John Sessions all starred in the...
was commissioned in 2007, which Dutton wrote with Ancona, Alan Francis and Alex Lowe
Alex Lowe (actor)
Alex Lowe is an English actor and comedian, who is best known as the creator and voice behind the character 'Barry from Watford' on Steve Wright's BBC Radio 2 show and Absolute Radio's Iain Lee Show-Barry from Watford:...
.
Dutton also writes extensively for children's television, including the sketch shows Spoof and Driving Me Mad, the long-running legendary sitcom ChuckleVision
ChuckleVision
ChuckleVision is a popular British television series shown mainly on CBBC. New episodes are always first aired on BBC One, and occasionally episodes are shown on BBC Two. The first episode was shown on 26 September 1987. It follows the adventures of the Chuckle Brothers & the Patton Brothers, who...
, and the 13-part sitcom Scoop
Scoop (TV Show)
Scoop is a children's TV series first broadcast by the BBC from January 2009 to presentand is written by Julian Dutton, Tom Jamieson and Nev Fountain, Martin Hughes & Rory Clark. It is currently on its third season....
, re-commissioned for a second series of 13 episodes for screening in 2010, and a third series for screening in 2011. Dutton was also commissioned to create and write a pilot for a new CBBC sitcom, Little Chucks, the adventures of Paul and Barry Chuckle
Chuckle Brothers
Barry Elliott and Paul Elliott , better known as the Chuckle Brothers, are British comedians. They are best known for their work on their BBC show ChuckleVision, which celebrated its 21st anniversary in March 2010 with a tour called An Audience with the Chuckle Brothers, which started in January...
as children, broadcast in 2010.
Recent television appearances include the Emmy Award
Emmy Award
An Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various...
-nominated My Life as a Popat
My Life as a Popat
My Life as a Popat follows the lives of an Indian family, through the eyes of their eldest son, Anand. The teenager fights a daily basis full of embarrassment. The second series brings a change to storyline, with brainbox Chetan Popat sometimes taking centre stage...
for ITV
ITV
ITV is the major commercial public service TV network in the United Kingdom. Launched in 1955 under the auspices of the Independent Television Authority to provide competition to the BBC, it is also the oldest commercial network in the UK...
, The Sarah Jane Adventures
The Sarah Jane Adventures
The Sarah Jane Adventures is a British science fiction television series, produced by BBC Cymru Wales for CBBC, created by Russell T Davies and starring Elisabeth Sladen...
, a Doctor Who
Doctor Who
Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
spin-off for CBBC
CBBC
CBBC is one of two brand names used for the BBC's children's television strands. Between 1985 and 2002, CBBC was the name given to all the BBC's programmes on TV for children aged under 14...
produced by Russell T Davies, Nuzzle and Scratch
Nuzzle and Scratch
Nuzzle and Scratch is a British children's television programme, shown on CBeebies.It stars two eponymous puppet alpacas created and developed by Barry Quinn and Alan Robinson and written by various writers.-Information:...
, a children's comedy series, and Scoop with Shaun Williamson
Shaun Williamson
Shaun Williamson is an English actor, singer, media personality and occasional presenter, best known for his former role as Barry Evans in soap opera EastEnders and as a version of himself in BBC sitcom Extras.- Career :...
.
In 2006/7 he performed a London run of his impressions show Look Back in Hunger, a one-man history of film and TV, and in early 2009 wrote and performed two new radio comedy series, Inside Alan Francis, with fellow comedian and actor Alan Francis, and a new impressions show, The Secret World, produced by Bill Dare
Bill Dare
Bill Dare is an English producer and devisor of radio and television comedy programmes.The son of the actor and broadcaster Peter Jones, he is a graduate of the University of Manchester who subsequently became an actor, director and writer...
, in which Dutton performs alongside star impressionists Jon Culshaw
Jon Culshaw
Jonathan Peter Culshaw is an English impressionist and comedian. He was educated at St Bede's RC High School, Ormskirk and St John Rigby College, in Orrell, Wigan....
, Lewis Macleod
Lewis MacLeod
Euan Lewis MacLeod is a prolific Scottish character actor, who can be heard as the voice of a huge number of television commercials, movie trailers and cartoons in his native UK. He voices characters such as Sebulba from Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace and Postman Pat...
, Duncan Wisbey
Duncan Wisbey
Duncan Wisbey is an English actor, musician, writer and impressionist. He is often credited as simply Wisbey.-Recordings and Appearances:...
and Jess Robinson
Jess Robinson
Jess Robinson , is an English up and coming comedy actress and impressionist.Jess started out in theatre and trained at The Arts Educational School, Tring Park as a singer. She played Little Voice in The Rise and Fall of Little Voice, by Jim Cartwright, at the Courtyard Theatre...
. He is also developing a silent comedy TV sketch show, The Dumb Show - a show devoted to purely visual comedy.
A third series of 13 episodes of his children's sitcom Scoop was commissioned and was filmed in the Autumn of 2010 for screening in 2011; and a second series of the hit impressions show "The Secret World" was broadcast on BBC R4 in September 2010.
He has also written columns for The Sunday Times
The Sunday Times
The Sunday Times is a British Sunday newspaper.The Sunday Times may also refer to:*The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times...
, The Independent on Sunday, and the London Evening Standard
Evening Standard
The Evening Standard, now styled the London Evening Standard, is a free local daily newspaper, published Monday–Friday in tabloid format in London. It is the dominant regional evening paper for London and the surrounding area, with coverage of national and international news and City of London...
, and a historical travel book, Shakespeare's Journey Home: a Traveller's Guide through Elizabethan England.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00583ZPGI
Personal
In 1995 he married Laura Sutton, p.a. to former Head of BBC Radio Comedy Jonathan James-MooreJonathan James-Moore
Jonathan James-Moore was an English theatre manager and BBC radio producer and executive.He was born in Worcestershire and educated at Bromsgrove School and Emmanuel College, Cambridge, where he graduated with a degree in engineering and served as Footlights president...
, with whom he has two children, Jack and Florence. He lives in the village of Lane End
Lane End, Buckinghamshire
Lane End is a village and civil parish within Wycombe district in Buckinghamshire, England. It is just south of the M40 from High Wycombe, about two miles west of Booker. The village is twinned with Saint-Pierre-d'Oléron in France....
in the Chiltern hills, Buckinghamshire
Buckinghamshire
Buckinghamshire is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan home county in South East England. The county town is Aylesbury, the largest town in the ceremonial county is Milton Keynes and largest town in the non-metropolitan county is High Wycombe....
.
Radio Series as a writer & performer
WeekendingThe News Huddlines
The News Huddlines
The News Huddlines was a long-running BBC Radio 2 topical comedy sketch show starring Roy Hudd that ran for fifty one series from 1975 until 2001. Each episode lasted for half an hour and consisted of topical sketches, songs and one-liners.-Performers:...
Mackay the New
Flying the Flag
Flying the Flag
-Synopsis:Created at the height of the Cold War, this BBC Radio 4 sitcom chronicled the vagaries of diplomatic life in a fictitious eastern-bloc country...
The Christopher Marlowe Mysteries
The Harpoon
The Harpoon
The Harpoon was a BBC Radio 4 series broadcast between 1991 and 1994, written by Julian Dutton and Peter Baynham. It consisted of three four part series and two Christmas specials, and was performed by Julian Dutton, Peter Baynham, Susie Brann, Alistair McGowan and Mary Elliott-Nelson, and was...
Struck Off and Die
Struck Off and Die
Struck Off and Die were a British comedy duo consisting of doctors Tony Gardner and Phil Hammond during the 1990s. Their material drew heavily on their knowledge and experience of healthcare, and took a particularly cynical view of the problems that beset the UK's National Health Service.They met...
Truly, Madly, Bletchley
Truly, Madly, Bletchley
Truly, Madly, Bletchley was a BBC Radio 4 comedy series from 1997 written by and starring comedian and impressionist Julian Dutton and produced by Dirk Maggs...
Harry Hill's Fruit Corner
Harry Hill's Fruit Corner
Harry Hill's Fruit Corner was a radio show broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in the United Kingdom. It starred Harry Hill. Hill achieved his big breakthrough in 1992 when he won the Perrier Award for Best Newcomer at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe...
Gush
Mammon
Mammon
Mammon is a term, derived from the Christian Bible, used to describe material wealth or greed, most often personified as a deity, and sometimes included in the seven princes of Hell.-Etymology:...
The Oldest Member
Ukridge
Richard Barton, General Practioner
Inside Alan Francis
The Secret World
Les Kelly’s Britain
Brian Gulliver's Travels
Brian Gulliver's Travels
Brian Gulliver's Travels is a satirical sitcom on BBC Radio 4 created and written by Bill Dare, first broadcast on 21st February, 2011. The series is a modern pastiche of the Jonathan Swift novel Gulliver's Travels. The series revolves around the character Brian Gulliver, played by Neil Pearson...
Reception
TV Series as a writer and performer
The BillThe Bill
The Bill is a police procedural television series that ran from October 1984 to August 2010. It focused on the lives and work of one shift of police officers, rather than on any particular aspect of police work...
Dempsey and Makepeace
Rockcliffe's Babies
Tucker's Luck
Tucker's Luck
Tucker's Luck was a British television series made by the BBC between 1983 and 1985.The series is a spin-off from the school drama Grange Hill and capitalised on the popularity of one of the series' original characters — Peter "Tucker" Jenkins, played by Todd Carty.Tucker's Luck followed the...
Friday Night Armistice
Jim Tavare Presents
Does China Exist?
Bore of the Year Awards
Time Gentlemen Please
Time Gentlemen Please
Time Gentlemen Please is a British sitcom. Commissioned by Sky One, it was primarily written by Richard Herring and Al Murray and ran for two series between 2000 and 2002.- Premise and characters :...
The Big Impression
Ronni Ancona & Co
Ronni Ancona & Co
Ronni Ancona & Co is a comedy sketch show that aired on BBC One and began on 25 May 2007. The sketches all consisted of impressions of well-known celebrities amongst other comedy sketches of fictional characters created by Ronni Ancona. Phil Cornwell, Jan Ravens and John Sessions all starred in the...
My Life as a Popat
My Life as a Popat
My Life as a Popat follows the lives of an Indian family, through the eyes of their eldest son, Anand. The teenager fights a daily basis full of embarrassment. The second series brings a change to storyline, with brainbox Chetan Popat sometimes taking centre stage...
Chucklevision
ChuckleVision
ChuckleVision is a popular British television series shown mainly on CBBC. New episodes are always first aired on BBC One, and occasionally episodes are shown on BBC Two. The first episode was shown on 26 September 1987. It follows the adventures of the Chuckle Brothers & the Patton Brothers, who...
Scoop
The Sarah Jane Adventures
The Sarah Jane Adventures
The Sarah Jane Adventures is a British science fiction television series, produced by BBC Cymru Wales for CBBC, created by Russell T Davies and starring Elisabeth Sladen...
The Stephen K. Amos Show