Chris Morris
Morris in 2010
Born	(1962-06-15)15 June 1962 (age 63) Buckden, Cambridgeshire, England
Occupations	Comedian radio presenter actor filmmaker
Years active	1986–present
Spouse	Jo Unwin
Children	2
Relatives	Tom Morris (brother)

Christopher J. Morris (born 15 June 1962) is an English comedian, radio presenter, actor and filmmaker. Known for hisdeadpan,dark humour,surrealism and controversial subject matter, he has been praised by theBritish Film Institute for his "uncompromising, moralistic drive".^[1]

In the early 1990s, Morris andArmando Iannucci createdOn the Hour, a satire of news programmes broadcast onBBC Radio 4. A television spinoff,The Day Today, launched the career ofSteve Coogan and was hailed as one of the most important satirical shows of the 1990s.^[2][3] Morris developed the satirical news format withBrass Eye, which lampooned celebrities whilst focusing on themes such as crime and drugs. TheBrass Eye episode "Paedogeddon", which satirised themoral panic surrounding paedophilia, became one of the most complained-about television programmes in British history.

Morris's similarly controversialpostmodernsketch comedy andambient music radio showBlue Jam gained acult following. It was adapted into the TV seriesJam, hailed as "the most radical and original television programme broadcast in years",^[4] and Morris won theBAFTA Award for Best Short Film after expanding aBlue Jam sketch intoMy Wrongs #8245–8249 & 117 starringPaddy Considine.Nathan Barley, a sitcom written withCharlie Brooker that satirisedhipsters, had low ratings but success with its DVD release. Morris joined the cast of sitcomThe IT Crowd, his first project in which he did not have writing or producing input.

In 2010, Morris directed his first feature-length film,Four Lions, which satirisesIslamic terrorism. Reception was largely positive, earning Morris theBAFTA for Outstanding Debut. He directed four episodes of Iannucci's political comedyVeep and appeared inThe Double andStewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle also serving as script-editor for the latter. His second feature-length film,The Day Shall Come, was released in 2019.

Christopher J. Morris was born on 15 June 1962 inBuckden, Cambridgeshire,^[5] the son of Rosemary Parrington^[5] and Paul Michael Morris.^[6] His father was aGP. Morris has a large redbirthmark almost completely covering the left side of his face and neck, which he disguises with makeup when acting.^[7] He grew up in a Victorian farmhouse in Buckden, which he described as "very dull".^[8] He has two younger brothers, including the theatre directorTom Morris.^[9] From an early age, Morris was a prankster and had a passion for radio. From the age of 10, he was educated at the independentJesuit boarding schoolStonyhurst College inStonyhurst, Lancashire.^[10] He studiedzoology at theUniversity of Bristol, where he gained a2:1.^[11]

After graduating from university, Morris pursued a career as a musician in various bands, for which he played the bass guitar.^[12] He went to work for Radio West, a radio station in Bristol. He then took up a news traineeship withBBC Radio Cambridgeshire, where he took advantage of access to editing and recording equipment to create elaboratespoofs and parodies.^[13] He also spent time in early 1987 hosting a 2–4pm afternoon show and later the Saturday morning showI.T.

In July 1987, Morris moved on toBBC Radio Bristol to present his own show,No Known Cure, broadcast on Saturday and Sunday mornings. The show was surreal and satirical, with odd interviews conducted with unsuspecting members of the public. He was fired from Bristol in 1990 after "talking over the news bulletins and making silly noises".^[14] In 1988 he also joined, from its launch,Greater London Radio (GLR). He presentedThe Chris Morris Show on GLR until 1993, when one show was suspended after a sketch was broadcast involving a child "outing" celebrities.^[15]

In 1991, Morris joinedArmando Iannucci's spoof news projectOn the Hour. Broadcast onBBC Radio 4, it saw him work alongside Iannucci,Steve Coogan,Stewart Lee,Richard Herring andRebecca Front.^[3] In 1992, Morris hostedDanny Baker's Radio 5 Morning Edition show for a week whilst Baker was on holiday. In 1994, Morris began a weekly evening show, theChris Morris Music Show, onBBC Radio 1 alongsidePeter Baynham and 'man with a mobile phone'Paul Garner. In the shows, Morris perfected the spoof interview style that would become a central component of hisBrass Eye programme. In the same year, Morris teamed up withPeter Cook (asSir Arthur Streeb-Greebling) in a series of improvised conversations forBBC Radio 3 entitledWhy Bother?.

In 1994, aBBC Two television series based onOn the Hour was broadcast under the nameThe Day Today.The Day Today made a star of Morris, and marked the television debut ofSteve Coogan'sAlan Partridge character. The programme ended on a high after just one series, with Morris winning the 1994British Comedy Award for Best Newcomer for his lead role as thePaxmanesque news anchor.^[17][3][18]

In 1996, Morris appeared on the daytime programmeThe Time, The Place, posing as an academic, Thurston Lowe, in a discussion entitled "Are British Men Lousy Lovers?", but was found out when a producer alerted the show's host,John Stapleton.^[17]

In 1997, theblack humour which had featured inOn the Hour andThe Day Today became more prominent inBrass Eye, another spoof of the current affairs television documentary, shown onChannel 4. All three series satirised and exaggerated issues expected of news shows with Brass Eye focusing particularly onmoral panics.^[19] The second episode for example, satirised drugs and the political rhetoric surrounding them.^[19][20] To help convey the satire, Morris invented a fictional drug by the name of "cake". In the episode, British celebrities and politicians describe the supposed symptoms in detail;David Amess mentioned the fictional drug at Parliament. In 2001, Morris satirised the moral panic regarding paedophilia in the most controversial episode ofBrass Eye, "Paedogeddon". Channel 4 apologised for the episode after receiving criticism from tabloids and around 3,000 complaints from viewers, which, at the time, was the most for an episode of British television.^[19] TheDaily Mail described Morris as "the most loathed man on TV".^[21]

From 1997 to 1999, Morris createdBlue Jam forBBC Radio 1, a surreal, taboo-breaking radio show set to an ambient soundtrack.^[1] It was adapted for Channel 4 asJam, broadcast in 2000.^[1] Morris released a 'remix' version of this, entitledJaaaaam.^[1]

In 2002, Morris directed the short filmMy Wrongs #8245–8249 & 117. It was the first release byWarp Films and won the 2003Bafta for best short film.^[22][23] In 2005 Morris worked on the sitcomNathan Barley, based on the character created byCharlie Brooker for his websiteTVGoHome (Morris had contributed to TVGoHome on occasion, under the pseudonym 'Sid Peach'^[24]). Co-written by Brooker and Morris, the series was broadcast onChannel 4 in early 2005.

Morris appeared inThe IT Crowd, aChannel 4 sitcom which focuses on the information technology department of the fictional company Reynholm Industries. The series was written and directed byGraham Linehan (with whom Morris collaborated onThe Day Today,Brass Eye andJam) and produced byAsh Atalla. Morris played Denholm Reynholm, the eccentric managing director of the company. This marked the first time Morris had acted in a substantial role in a project which he has not developed himself. Morris's character was killed off during episode two of the second series. His character made a brief return in the first episode of the third series.

In November 2007, Morris wrote an article forThe Observer in response toRonan Bennett's article published six days earlier inThe Guardian. Bennett's article, "Shame on us", accused the novelistMartin Amis of racism. Morris's response, "The absurd world of Martin Amis", was also highly critical of Amis; although he did not accede to Bennett's accusation of racism, Morris likened Amis to the Muslim clericAbu Hamza (who was jailed forinciting racial hatred in 2006), suggesting that both men employ "mock erudition, vitriol and decontextualised quotes from the Qu'ran" to incite hatred.^[25]

Morris was a script editor for the 2009 seriesStewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle, with Lee, Eldon and Iannucci. He maintained this role for the second (2011) and third series (2014), also appearing as a mock interviewer dubbed the "hostile interrogator" in the third and fourth series.

Morris completed his debut feature filmFour Lions in late 2009, a satire based on a group of Islamist terrorists in Sheffield.^[27]It premiered at theSundance Film Festival in January 2010 and was short-listed for the festival's World Cinema Narrative prize.^[28] The film (working titleBoilerhouse) was picked up byFilm Four.^[29] Morris toldThe Sunday Times that the film sought to do for Islamic terrorism what the BBC sitcomDad's Army for theNazis by showing them as "scary but also ridiculous".^[30]

In 2012, Morris directed the seventh and penultimate episode of the first season ofVeep, an Armando Iannucci-devised American version ofThe Thick of It.^[31] In 2013, he returned to direct two episodes for the second season ofVeep, and a further episode for season three in 2014.

In 2013, Morris appeared briefly inRichard Ayoade'sThe Double, a black comedy film based on theFyodor Dostoyevskynovella of the same name. Morris had previously worked with Ayoade onNathan Barley andThe IT Crowd.

In February 2014, Morris made a surprise appearance at the beginning of aStewart Lee live show, introducing Lee with fictional anecdotes about their work together.^[32] The following month, Morris appeared in the third series ofStewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle as a "hostile interrogator",^[33] a role previously occupied by Iannucci.

In December 2014, it was announced that a short radio collaboration withNoel Fielding and Richard Ayoade would be broadcast on BBC Radio 6.^[34] According to Fielding, the work had been in progress since around 2006.^[35] However, in January 2015 it was decided, 'in consultation with [Morris]', that the project was not yet complete, and so the intended broadcast did not go ahead.^[36]

A statement released byFilm4 in February 2016 made reference to funding what would be Morris's second feature film.^[37] In November 2017 it was reported that Morris had shot the movie, starringAnna Kendrick, in theDominican Republic^[38] but the title was not made public. It was later reported in January 2018 thatJim Gaffigan andRupert Friend had joined the cast of the still-untitled film, and that the plot would revolve around an FBI hostage situation gone wrong.^[39] The film,The Day Shall Come, had its world premiere atSouth by Southwest on 11 March 2019.^[40]

Morris often co-writes and performs incidental music for his television shows, notably withJam and the 'extended remix' version,Jaaaaam. In the early 1990s Morris contributed aPixies parody track entitled "Motherbanger" to aflexi-disc given away with an edition ofSelect music magazine.^[41] Morris supplied sketches for British bandSaint Etienne's 1993 single "You're in a Bad Way" (the sketch 'Spongbake' appears at the end of the 4th track on the CD single).

In 2000, Morris collaborated by mail withAmon Tobin to create the track "Bad Sex", which was released as a B-side on the Tobin single "Slowly".^[42]Anglo-French bandStereolab's song "Nothing to Do with Me" from their 2001 albumSound-Dust featured various lines from Chris Morris sketches as lyrics.^[43]

Ramsey Ess ofVulture described Morris's comedy style as "crass" and "shocking", but noted an "underlying morality" and integrity, as well as the humour being Morris's priority.^[19]

In 2003, Morris was listed inThe Observer as one of the 50 funniest acts in British comedy.^[44] In 2005,Channel 4 aired a show calledThe Comedian's Comedian in which foremost writers and performers of comedy ranked their 50 favourite acts. Morris was at number eleven.^[45] Morris won the BAFTA for outstanding debut with his filmFour Lions. Adeel Akhtar and Nigel Lindsay collected the award in his absence.^[46] Lindsay stated that Morris had sent him a text message before they collected the award reading, 'Doused in petrol,Zippo at the ready'.^[47] In June 2012 Morris was placed at number 16 in the Top 100 People in UK Comedy.^[48]

In 2010, a biography,Disgusting Bliss: The Brass Eye of Chris Morris, was published. Written by Lucian Randall, the book depicted Morris as "brilliant but uncompromising", and a "frantic-minded perfectionist".^[49]

In November 2014,BBC Radio 4 Extra broadcast a three-hour retrospective of Morris's radio career called 'Raw Meat Radio', which was presented byMary Anne Hobbs and featured interviews withArmando Iannucci,Peter Baynham,Paul Garner, and others.^[50]

Morris won theBest TV Comedy Newcomer award from the British Comedy Awards in 1994 for his performance inThe Day Today.^[51] He has won twoBAFTA awards: theBAFTA Award for Best Short Film in 2002 forMy Wrongs #8245–8249 & 117,^[52] and the BAFTA Award for Outstanding Debut by a British director, writer or producer in 2011 forFour Lions.^[53]

Morris and his wife, actress-turned-literary agent Jo Unwin, live inBrixton, London.^[54] The pair met in 1984 at theEdinburgh Festival, when he was playing bass guitar for theCambridge Footlights Revue and she was in a comedy troupe called the Millies.^[54] They have two sons.^[54]

• Various works atBBC Radio Cambridgeshire (1986–1987) (presenter)
• No Known Cure (July 1987 – March 1990,BBC Radio Bristol) (presenter)
• Chris Morris (1988–1993,BBC GLR) (presenter)
• Morning Edition (July 1990, BBC Radio 5) (guest presenter)
• The Chris Morris Christmas Show (25 December 1990,BBC Radio 1)
• On the Hour (1991–1992, BBC Radio 4) (co-writer, performer)
• It's Only TV (September 1992,LWT) (unbroadcast pilot)
• Why Bother? (1994,BBC Radio 3) (performer, editor)
• The Chris Morris Music Show (1994, BBC Radio 1) (presenter)
• Blue Jam (1997–1999, BBC Radio 1) (writer, director, performer, editor)
• Second Class Male/Time To Go (1999, satirical newspaper column forThe Observer)
• The Smokehammer (2002, website)
• Absolute Atrocity Special (2002, newspaper pullout forThe Observer)

• Media related toChris Morris at Wikimedia Commons
• Chris Morris atBritish Comedy Guide
• Chris Morris atIMDb

• 1962 births
• Living people
• Alumni of the University of Bristol
• Comedians from Essex
• English film directors
• English male comedians
• English male screenwriters
• English male television actors
• English radio DJs
• English radio writers
• English satirists
• English screenwriters
• Outstanding Debut by a British Writer, Director or Producer BAFTA Award winners
• People educated at Stonyhurst College
• People from Buckden, Cambridgeshire
• Entertainers from Colchester
• British radio show creators
• British television show creators
• British satirical radio show creators
• British satirical television show creators
• English columnists
• British satirical columnists
• British humourous columnists
• Counterculture of the 1990s
• Counterculture of the 2000s
• Counterculture of the 2010s
• Counterculture of the 2020s

• Articles with short description
• Short description is different from Wikidata
• Use dmy dates from June 2023
• Use British English from February 2013
• All Wikipedia articles written in British English
• Articles with hCards
• Commons category link is on Wikidata