Steve Coogan
Coogan was on top of the U.S. box-office as part of the ensemble cast in Ben Stiller's hit satire, Tropic Thunder. In the film directed and written by Stiller, Coogan played a British film director making a movie about the Vietnam War. He co-starred opposite the star studded cast of Robert Downey Jr., Jack Black, Brandon T. Jackson, Tom Cruise and Matthew McConaughey. The film was #1 for two straight weeks and has earned over $100 million domestically.
Coogan was also recently seen in the 2008 Sundance Film Festival breakout hit comedy, Hamlet 2. Directed by Andrew Fleming, the film also starred Catherine Keener, Amy Poehler and David Arquette.
Born and raised in Manchester where he trained as an actor at the Manchester Polytechnic School of Theatre, Coogan saw stand-up as a way of obtaining an equity card. He was spotted by a television scout and offered a spot on First Exposure, which led to many television appearances including "The Prince's Gala Trust for the Prince and Princess of Wales, Stand-Up, Up-Front, Paramount City, London Underground and Word in Your Ear. He was also a regular voice on Spitting Image" for several years.
In 1992, he won the Perrier Award for his show Steve Coogan in Character with John Thompson, where he launched his character ‘Paul Calf'. ‘Paul' became a regular on Saturday Zoo, on which he also introduced a new character, Paul's sister, ‘Pauline Calf'. He went on to write and perform in The Paul Calf Video Diaries, earning a BAFTA Award Nomination for his performance in Pauline Calf's video diary Three Fights, Two Weddings and a Funeral.
While working in radio, he created another memorable character ‘Alan Partridge' in On the Hour which became the television show The Day Today. That, in turn, spawned the radio show Knowing Me, Knowing You with Alan Partridge which also made the transition to television and received huge critical acclaims along with numerous awards. At the 1994 British Comedy Awards, Coogan won Top Male Comedy Performer, Top Comedy Personality while Knowing Me, Knowing You won Best New Television Comedy. Not one to rest, Coogan then completed a sell out tour in the U.K. with his live show The Man Who Think's He's It, which won a South Bank Show Award and broke all boxoffice records for a comedy show in London's West End.
Wanting to spend more time on his writing talents, Coogan took a sabbatical from performing to write the film The Parole Officer with his business partner, Henry Normal. The film, produced by Duncan Kenworthy and Andrew Macdonald and directed by John Duigan, became one of the top grossing British films of the year.
Coogan and Normal continued their partnership and created their own production company, Baby Cow Production, in 1999. They have since produced a number of award-winning programs such as Marion and Geoff, Human Remains, The Mighty Boosh, Gavin and Stacey, Sensitive Skin, Dr Terrible's House of Horrible, A Small Summer Party, Up in Town and Cruise of the Gods, a TV film made for BBC 2. In 2002, he released a new series of I'm Alan Partridge, which again received rave reviews and earned him two BAFTA Awards for Best Comedy Series and Best Comedy Performance.
Other film credits for Coogan include Resurrected, Indian in the Cupboard, Revengers Comedies, The Fix Wind in the Willows, Jim Jarmusch's Coffee & Cigarettes, 24 Hour Party People, Around the World in Eighty Days (playing the lead of Phileas Fogg), A Cock And Bull Story, Happy Endings, Marie Antoinette, The Private Life of Samuel Pepys, Finding Amanda. This year, he will also be seen opposite of Hilary Duff and Molly Shannon in Safety Glass.
Coogan's most recent television appearance was in the 2007 season finale of HBO's award-winning Curb Your Enthusiasm, playing Larry David's psychologist who ends up in jail. He also wrote and starred in a Christmas Special for BBC 2 titled Tony Ferrino's Phenomenon (for which he received the Silver Rose of Montreux Award) and the BBC 2 comedy shows Saxondale and Coogan's Run.
Coogan recently wrapped his second tour entitled "Steve Coogan is Alan Partridge and Other Less Successful Characters." The comedy tour was comprised of 40 dates, many of which were sold out, and the show included many of his other comedy creations, such as ‘Paul Calf' and his ‘sister', Pauline Calf.
Steve Coogan Facts
Occupation | Comedian |
Birthday | October 14, 1965 (57) |
Sign | Libra |
Birthplace | Middleton, England, United Kingdom |
Height | 5' 10½" (1m79) How tall is Steve Coogan compared to you? |
Selected Filmography
Steve Coogan Collection, The | ||
Alan Partridge | ||
The Hangman: Shepherds and Butchers | ||
The Trip | ||
Alice Through the Looking Glass | ||
Alan Partridge's Scissored Isle | ||
Saxondale | ||
Lies & Alibis | ||
The Trip to Italy | ||
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