Comedy God

Chris Morris is a British writer and performer of comedy. He is a genius, whose work has been consistently hilarious and sometimes almost unbelievably over-the-top. He has put his indelible mark on radio, television, and the printed media. Morris's work is characterised by surreal situations and concepts, off-kilter sentence construction, and bending taboos until they snap causing sticky tabloid outrage.

In several projects Morris has taken prank interviews (previously the staple of moronic "shock-jocks") to new extremes. Sometimes it is hard to believe that the "victim" isn't in on the scam. He has extensively satirised television news, and (most prominently in Blue Jam) has shown a fixation with doctors, children, animals and death. Morris never shocks for the sake of being controversial - his work always seems to have a message, even if it's a bleak, ambiguous or just plain demented one.

He recieved a lot of press attention and critical acclaim in the Brass Eye phase of his career, where he conclusively demonstrated that current affairs broadcasting was broken beyond repair, and the "concerned" pleas of celebrities could be bought and sold. Morris's master work was eventually frustrated by the bumbling of supposedly-liberal Channel Four suits.

If you haven't seen/heard Morris's work, you are missing out on the state of the art.

This Him Done What When

The Eighties: Records humourous interviews with members of the public. As a hobby. Goes to Bristol University and gets a degree in Zoology. Briefly played bass in a band. In 1985 he started working in local radio, and from the very start got into trouble for doing pranks and messing about. 1987 began a two-year run as a DJ on Radio Bristol ("No Known Cure", featuring Wayne Carr).

until 1991: DJing on GLR. Spoof interviews (feedback reports) for Sky.

1991-92: On The Hour, spoof news show, Radio Four. Records a flexi-disc for Select magazine (featuring the song Mother Banger).

1993: Why Bother?, series of interviews with Peter Cook (in Arthur Streeb-Greebling guise). Later released on tape.

1994: The Day Today, TV adaptation of On The Hour, BBC2. 26 episodes of the legendary Chris Morris Music Show on Radio One.

1997: Brass Eye, six-episode Panorama-style spoof show, including celebrity "guests".

1997-99: Three series of Blue Jam, bleak and atmospheric radio show of sketches and monologues, Radio One. Recently compiled on CD (warprecords.com)

1999: Time To Go and Second Class Male, a 12-part Guardian me-column parody written as Richard Keefe, a man who has sworn to kill himself in six months time.

2000: Jam, TV adaptation of Blue Jam largely reusing existing material from that show, Channel Four.

2001: Brass Eye Special is aired, causing the Daily Mail to become even more agitated.

2002: Satirical articles about the War on Terror (with Armando Iannucci), and a short film made in conjunction with Warp Records called My Wrongs Nos 8245-8249 and 117.

Happy now?

www.CookdAndBombd.com

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