| Richard Herring | |
|---|---|
 Herring during the final performance ofAs It Occurs To Me in 2011 | |
| Birth name | Richard Keith Herring |
| Born | (1967-07-12)12 July 1967 (age 57) Pocklington,East Riding of Yorkshire, England |
| Medium | Stand up,radio,television,podcast |
| Education | The Kings of Wessex School |
| Alma mater | St Catherine's College, Oxford |
| Years active | 1987–present |
| Genres | Black comedy,insult comedy,satire,irony,wit,deadpan |
| Spouse | |
| Children | 2 |
| Notable works and roles | Fist of Fun This Morning with Richard Not Judy Time Gentlemen Please The Collings and Herrin Podcast Richard Herring's Leicester Square Theatre Podcast |
Richard Keith Herring (born 12 July 1967)[1] is an Englishstand-up comedian and writer whose early work includes the comedydouble actLee and Herring (alongsideStewart Lee). He is described byThe British Theatre Guide as "one of the leading hidden masters of modern British comedy".[2]
Towards the end of the double act, Herring also worked as a writer, producing four plays. After Lee and Herring went their separate ways he co-wrote thesitcomTime Gentlemen Please, but quickly returned to performance withconcept-drivenone-person shows likeTalking Cock,Hitler Moustache andChrist on a Bike as well as regular circuit stand-up. Herring has created fourteen of these stand-up shows since 2001, performing them for eleven consecutive years from 2004 to 2014 at theEdinburgh Festival Fringe, with annual tours and a final performance recorded for DVD. His 2016–17 show was a 'best of' tour, drawing from these shows.[3]
Herring is recognised as a pioneer of comedypodcasting,[4][5][6] initially with broadcasterAndrew Collins onThe Collings and Herrin Podcast and subsequently with high-profile comedians and celebrities such asDawn French,Michael Palin andStephen Fry onRichard Herring's Leicester Square Theatre Podcast. He has maintained a daily blog calledWarming Up without a break since 25 November 2002.[7] His blog is archived by theBritish Library for purposes of UK documentary heritage.[8]In September 2024 he started publishing the blog (and other material) on Substack where he has 10000+ subscribers.
Richard Herring was born inPocklington,East Riding of Yorkshire, and grew up inCheddar, Somerset.[9] He is the youngest of three children.[10] He attendedThe Kings of Wessex School, where his father was the headmaster and maths teacher. This later formed the basis of his 2008 stand-up show,The Headmaster's Son. Herring’s mother was also a teacher.[10] The 2007ITV comedy dramaYou Can Choose Your Friends, which he wrote and also starred in, was based on his family.[10] Some of the same characters later featured in the Radio 4 series "Relativity".
Herring was a student atSt Catherine's College, Oxford, where he wrote and performed for a comedy troupe known as theSeven Raymonds as well as theOxford Revue. He attained a2:1 inHistory.[11]
Between 1992 and 2000, Richard was half of the stand-up comedydouble act withStewart Lee. Their television work includedFist of Fun, Festival of Fun, andThis Morning With Richard Not Judy, and they had been collaborating on stage and radio projects since the 1980s.
Lee and Herring wrote material forChris Morris andArmando Iannucci'sOn the Hour in 1991 and the duo contributed to the creation of the character that was to beAlan Partridge.[12] In 1992 and 1993, they wrote and performedLionel Nimrod's Inexplicable World forRadio 4. ForRadio 1, they wrote and performed one series ofFist of Fun in 1993, remaking it for television in 1995 and 1996. They hosted a series on Radio 1 in 1994 and 1995, calledLee and Herring. A final television partnership with Lee,This Morning With Richard Not Judy, ran for 18 episodes over two series until being cancelled "as a result of BBC management reshuffles".[13]
Herring has written and performed in fourteenone-person shows, eleven of them in consecutive years. A Herring show typically starts with a run at theEdinburgh Festival Fringe, continues with an extensive UK tour and ends with a recorded performance for DVD.
For radio, Herring co-wrote and presented the history-based sketch showThat Was Then, This Is Now. For television, he co-wroteAl Murray's sitcomTime Gentlemen Please. He also contributed to the third series ofLittle Britain as script editor.
In 2005, he presented achat show calledHeads Up with Richard Herring on the Pokerzone channel, in which he interviewed professionalpoker players and celebrities about their careers and their love of the game. There were 10 episodes in total.[14]
In February 2007, filming began on Herring'scomedy dramaYou Can Choose Your Friends. As well as writing the script, he also acted alongsideGordon Kennedy,Claire Skinner,Rebecca Front,Sarah-Jane Potts,Robert Daws,Anton Rodgers andJulia McKenzie. The show was broadcast onITV on 7 June 2007.[15]
In January 2008 he began theCollings and Herrin (sic) podcast withAndrew Collins. They celebrated their second anniversary with a live "100th" podcast (it was actually the 105th recording) at theLeicester Square Theatre. On 30 January 2010 the pair began a tenure of sitting in forAdam and Joe on BBC Radio 6 Music on Saturdays mornings, a slot they occupied for more than a year.[16]
Herring's 2008 stand-up setThe Headmaster's Son earned four 5-star reviews and several 4-star reviews.[17][18][19] The set covers his experience growing up inThe Kings of Wessex School in Somerset where his father worked as headmaster and how this may have been the origin of his fondness for telling puerile jokes. The show was seen by critics as a thoughtful look at his upbringing,[2] and his relationship with his father, to whom the show is dedicated.
Herring launched his show,Hitler Moustache in 2009 to see if he "could reclaim thetoothbrush moustache for comedy – it wasChaplin's first, then Hitler ruined it."[20] The show discusses broader issues, such as fascism and theBritish National Party.[21] Herring and some of his contemporaries, includingDave Gorman, were angered when material from his show was misrepresented in aGuardian column by critic Brian Logan.[22][20][21][23]
On 14 October 2010, his Radio 4 seriesRichard Herring's Objective was first broadcast. Here Herring attempts to reclaim controversial items, starting with the toothbrush moustache and moving onto thehoodie,Flag of England andDolly the Sheep. An Edinburgh special about theSee-you-Jimmy hat was broadcast in August 2011 and a second series was recorded in October 2011 with episodes about thegolliwog, thewheelchair,Page 3 andthe old school tie.[24]
On 27 December 2010, Herring finished second onCelebrity Mastermind with a final score of 34 points. His specialist subject wasRasputin.[25] He wasThe Pod Delusion "Comedian of the Year 2010."[26]
In May 2011 it was announced thatFist of Fun would be released on DVD by Go Faster Stripe. The first series was released in December 2011[27] and the second in November 2012,[28] winning 'Best DVD' at the 2013Chortle Awards[29]
In August and September 2015, he performed all 11 of his previous one man shows, plus a new one,Happy Now?, at the Leicester Square Theatre over the course of six weekends in a season called "The Twelve Shows of Herring".[30]Happy Now? was taken on a 50-plus date UK tour between October 2015 and June 2016. His 2017 tour show was calledRichard Herring — The Best. His 2017 Edinburgh Fringe show is called "Oh Frig, I'm 50!" This was taken on a UK tour in the Spring of 2018.
In 2020, Herring was a contestant on the tenth series ofTaskmaster.[31] He was the series' eventual winner. Herring later returned to compete against fellow winnersEd Gamble,Kerry Godliman,Liza Tarbuck andLou Sanders for the second "Champion of Champions" special, which he also won.
In May 2024 he began a tour of a new stand up show, 'Can I Have My Ball Back?' based on his experience of testicular cancer.[32] A second leg of the tour began on 31st January 2025.
On 25 November 2002 Herring started his blog,Warming Up, as a way to overcomewriter's block.[33] He has written an entry for every day, and has over 7,000 consecutive entries. His regular readership is estimated to be around 3,000. Some ideas recorded inWarming Up have been used in his live shows. The first year of his blog is collected in two books,Bye Bye Balham andThe Box Lady and Other Pesticles.
On 12 October 2009, Herring recorded the first episode ofAs It Occurs To Me, a weekly radio-style stand-up and sketch show made for the Internet. It stars himself alongsideEmma Kennedy,Dan Tetsell and Christian Reilly. It currently stands at 18 episodes and 5 bonus mini-episodes. It was nominated for best internet show at the 2010Sony Awards, though it failed to place. On 7 February 2011,As It Occurs to Me won the first Chortle Internet award[34] On 20 March 2012 he retained it.[35] In 2017,As It Occurs To Me returned as a six-episodeweb series.
In 2011, Herring began playing himself at snooker for an audio podcast called "Me1 vs Me2 Snooker". On 28 July 2016 he performed at the Tempting Failure extreme art festival[36] In 2020 he started playing this with 32 personas on Twitch and appeared on Comedians: Home Alone on BBC2 in July with an edited frame of Me1 vs Me2.[37]
In 2012, Herring recorded the first 16 episodes of the long-runningRichard Herring's Leicester Square Theatre Podcast with guests includingTim Minchin, Herring's comedy partner Stewart Lee,Adam Buxton,David Mitchell andArmando Iannucci.[38] It was nominated for a Sony Award for Best Comedy alongside a list of BBC produced comedy shows in 2013.[39] The show won the Bronze Award.[40] In 2013, Herring won the Chortle Award for the podcast, which again won the award in 2014.[29][41] In May and June 2013 he recorded nine podcasts with guests includingStephen Fry,Russell Brand andMary Beard.[42] His interview withStephen Fry was covered by national and international news media including theBBC andSky News when Fry revealed a recent suicide attempt.[43][44] The series continued withHarry Shearer,Eddie Izzard andDavid Cross.
On 17 November 2013, he recorded the first episode of a six-part internet stand-up, sketch and interview showRichard Herring's Meaning of Life, structured around the philosophical concepts of 'Creation', 'the Paranormal', 'Love', 'Death', 'Good & Evil' and 'the Shape of Things To Come',[45][46][47] the episode being broadcast online between February 2014 and early 2015.
In February 2014, the firstRichard Herring Show was broadcast onFubar Radio.[48] Herring presented this with comedianLou Sanders weekly, before quitting the show together; their final episode was broadcast on 24 May 2014.
On 8 March 2018, in aid ofInternational Women’s Day, Herring raised over £150,000 fordomestic abuse charityRefuge by responding to anyone onTwitter who asked whenInternational Men's Day was (it is 19 November).[49][50] He did the same on 8 March 2019, raising almost £130,000.[51] He repeated the exercise on 8 March 2020 and streamed himself responding to tweets live on Twitch. He raised a further £70,000.[52] In 2020 he wrote a book about his experiences and toxic masculinity calledThe Problem With Men which was published on 5 November.[53]
In March 2020 Herring started streaming regularly on Twitch as the world went into lockdown. He produced weekly remote episodes of his podcast,Richard Herring'sLeicester Square Theatre Podcast, did a live feed of Stone Clearing most weekday mornings and played himself at snooker (with 32 personas) in the evening. He also did occasional non-director's commentaries for films, as well as a newspaper review with his 128-year-old ventriloquist dummy calledAlly and Herring's Twitch of Fun.[54][55]
In June 2023, Herring announced he would be touringRichard Herring's Leicester Square Theatre Podcast around the UK starting September 2023.[56]
 | This section of abiography of a living persondoes notinclude anyreferences or sources. Please help by addingreliable sources. Contentious material about living people that is unsourced or poorly sourcedmust be removed immediately. Find sources: "Richard Herring" – news ·newspapers ·books ·scholar ·JSTOR(March 2023) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
| Year | Show | Cycle | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Edinburgh | Tour | DVD | ||||
| 1994 | Richard Herring is Fat[58] | Yes | ||||
| 1995 | Richard Herring is All Man[59][60] | Yes | ||||
| 2001 | Christ on a Bike | Yes | Yes | |||
| 2002/3 | Talking Cock[61] | Yes | Yes | |||
| 2004 | The 12 Tasks of Hercules Terrace[62] | Yes | Yes | Yes | ||
| 2005 | Someone Likes Yoghurt[63] | Yes | Yes | Yes | ||
| 2006 | Ménage à un[64] | Yes | Yes | Yes | ||
| 2007 | Oh Fuck, I'm 40![65] | Yes | Yes | Yes | ||
| 2008 | The Headmaster's Son[66] | Yes | Yes | Yes | ||
| 2009 | Hitler Moustache[67] | Yes | Yes | Yes | ||
| 2010 | Christ on a Bike: The Second Coming[68] | Yes | Yes | Yes | ||
| 2011 | What Is Love, Anyway?[69] | Yes | Yes | Yes | ||
| 2012 | Talking Cock: The Second Coming[70] | Yes | Yes | Yes | ||
| 2013 | We're All Going To Die![71] | Yes | Yes | Yes | ||
| 2014 | Lord of the Dance Settee[72] | Yes | Yes | Yes | ||
| 2015 | Happy Now? | No | Yes | Yes | ||
| 2016 | Richard Herring: The Best | No | Yes | No | ||
| 2017 | Oh Frig, I'm 50![73] | Yes | Yes | Yes | ||
| 2024/5 | Can I Have My Ball Back? | No | Yes | No | ||
Television[edit]
| Plays[edit]
|
Film[edit]
| Radio[edit]
|
Podcasts/vodcasts[edit]
| Miscellaneous home media[edit]
|
| Title | Publisher | ISBN | Year |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fist of Fun (With Stewart Lee) | BBC Books | ISBN 0-563-37185-4;ISBN 978-0-563-37185-4 | 1995 |
| Talking Cock | Ebury | ISBN 978-1-56025-608-3 | 2003 (reprinted 2012) |
| Warming Up Volume I: Bye Bye Balham | Go Faster Stripe | ISBN 978-0-9560901-0-2 | 2008 |
| How Not To Grow Up | Ebury | ISBN 0-09-193208-4ISBN 978-0-09-193208-4 | 2010 |
| Warming Up Volume II: The Box Lady and Other Pesticles | Go Faster Stripe | 2012 | |
| Emergency Questions | Go Faster Stripe | 2017 | |
| Christmas Emergency Questions | Go Faster Stripe | 2017 | |
| Emergency Questions: 1001 conversation-savers for any situation | Sphere | ISBN 9780751574395ISBN 978-0751574395 | 2018 |
| The Problem With Men | Sphere | ISBN 0751581453ISBN 978-0751581454 | 2020 |
| A Guide to Ye Ancient Fcience of Ftone Clearing | Sky Potato | 2020 | |
| Punani Self-Playing Snooker Sticker Album | Sky Potato | 2020 | |
| Would You Rather? | Sphere | ISBN 0751585718ISBN 978-0751585711 | 2021 |
| Can I Have My Ball Back? | Sphere | 2022 |
Herring was formerly in a relationship with the actressJulia Sawalha,[111] some years after joking onFist of Fun that "My ideal woman has the head of Julia Sawalha and the body of Julia Sawalha."
Before Sawalha he dated the actressCatherine Shepherd as revealed bySally Phillips in 2022 on Herring's RHLSTP 409 podcast.[112]
He also datedKelly Marcel[113] and Sally Phillips.[114]
In April 2012, Herring married author and comedianCatie Wilkins.[115] They had their first child, a daughter, in February 2015, followed by a son in October 2017.[116]
Herring has raised money forScope since 2003, and ran theLondon Marathon in aid of the charity in 2004[117][118] as well as the Royal Parks Foundation Half Marathon in 2011, 2013 and 2014.[119] In January 2011 he was nominated for a Just Giving Life Time Achievement Award for his extensive work in helping to raise money, awareness and support for Scope.[120] In 2012 he was made a Patron of Scope.[121]
In 2010 he was made a patron ofHumanists UK (formerly The British Humanist Association)[122] and said:
"It’s the 21st century and it’s time the human race accepted that we’re flying this plane and no one out there is going to save us from crashing it. So let’s work together, hey?"[123]
In February 2021 he had anorchidectomy to remove a canceroustesticle, undergoing one shot ofchemotherapy a month later.[124] In November 2021 he ran the Hertfordshire Half Marathon and raised £30,000 for the hospitals that treated his condition.[125] His book about the experienceCan I Have My Ball Back? was published in October 2022. In April 2022 it was announced that Herring had become an Ambassador forMovember.[126]
TheUniversity of Kent holds material relating to Herring's career as part of the British Stand-Up Comedy Archive.[127][128] The Richard Herring Collection contains performance scripts, promotional items, published material, and digital documents and scans.[128]
{{cite web}}:|author= has generic name (help){{cite web}}:|author= has generic name (help)
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Artists | |
