Simon Munnery

Simon Munnery, also known as his characters "Alan Parker: Urban Warrior" and "The League Against Tedium", is an English comedian.

He performs mainly to an alternative audience but has pierced the mainstream both with his BBC Radio 1 show in 1997 and his BBC2 television series '' Attention Scum!'' in 2001. His stand-up is often satirical and political and almost always surreal.

Munnery's experimental style is reflected in his makeshift, often elaborate props. As "The League" he often wore a hat crafted from a kettle, epaulets that contained working model tanks, and shoes covered in roses. In ''Buckethead'' he played a character who performed the entire show with a metal bucket over his head.

Early life

Born in Middlesex, Munnery grew up in Bedmond and was educated at Watford Grammar School for Boys, where he earned four A Levels. He read natural sciences at Trinity College, Cambridge but soon lost interest in science and joined the Footlights. In 1987, he became vice-president with Peter Bradshaw as president. After graduating with "a very high third", he did various menial jobs before making his big break into comedy. He has described praise of his work as implying his work occupies a place between "unfunny comedy" and "shit art".

Munnery had a short-lived career as a video game programmer. His most famous title was a version of ''Asteroids'' for the Commodore International VIC-20 (a game that Jeff Minter once described as a "pile of wank"). He also authored several games for the ZX81 (''Road Race'', '' Breakout'' and ''Space Invaders'') and the ZX Spectrum. The VIC-20 games he wrote were ''Asteroids'', '' Cosmiads'' and ''Scramble''.

Career

Stand-up comedy

While at university, Munnery took part in a stand-up double-act called ''God and Jesus'' with Stephen Cheeke. He also worked (along with Steve Coogan, Patrick Marber, Richard Herring and Stewart Lee) at the Edinburgh Festival in a piece called ''The Dum Show''.

Munnery was brought to the attention of a comedy community as the compere of a post-alternative comedy cabaret called '' Cluub Zarathustra'' performed originally in London and later at the Edinburgh Festival. ''Cluub Zarathustra'' featured Stewart Lee, Kevin Eldon, Sally Phillips, Johnny Vegas, Julian Barratt, Richard Herring, Roger Mann, Jason Freeman and the music of Richard Thomas and Loré Lixenberg. A television pilot was made of Cluub Zarathustra for Channel 4 in 1996, but was never broadcast. It became the subject of a book by Robert Wringham in 2012.

Munnery's Edinburgh Fringe shows include ''Trilogy'', ''Buckethead'' and ''Simon Munnery's Annual General Meeting''.

His 2006 Edinburgh Fringe show, ''AGM'', included the opportunity for the audience to raise questions to discuss as group (such as "is there a God?"). The experience would often continue after the main show, when he takes the audience on tours around town, taking in art galleries, drinks and visits to other shows.

In 2010, Munnery hosted a Bright Club event at the Bloomsbury Theatre.

Television

''Futurtv'' ("Not 'Future TV', oh no. It can't be 'Future TV' – it's right now!") was a BBC production for UK Play from 1999. There were 13 15-minute episodes. As well as Simon Munnery, it included ''Kombat Opera Presents'' (Loré Lixenberg and Richard Thomas) and a selection of pop videos.

Munnery wrote and hosted the 1999 TV comedy game show, '' Either/Or''.

'' Attention Scum!'' was a television series produced for the BBC and directed by Stewart Lee, which aired from February 2001. It starred Munnery as 'The League Against Tedium', a character who drove around the United Kingdom in an adapted transit van, preaching to the masses with the help of an opera singer (Loré Lixenberg), a sedated vampire (Richard Thomas), and a monkey (Munnery's wife Janet).

Munnery also appeared in sketches in the first series of ''Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle'' in 2009, and in Lee's ''The Alternative Comedy Experience'' for Comedy Central.

Radio

During the 1990s he made several series for BBC Radio 1, one based around his ''League Against Tedium'' character. Others were vehicles for his Alan Parker character, including ''Alan Parker'', '' Alan Parker's 29 Minutes of Truth'', and ''Alan Parker, Road Warrior'' for which he won the Sony Radio Award.

Munnery has returned to radio in the early 2000s, hosting ''Simon Munnery's Experimental Half Hour'' ("experimental in that it lasts an hour") and ''Simon Munnery Weakly Chats'' on Resonance FM. He also wrote and performed two four-part Radio 4 series called "Where Did It All Go Wrong?", which were broadcast in the summer of 2003 and the spring of 2005.

In 1999, together with John Hegley, he made a comedy series for BBC Radio 4 called '' The Adventures of John and Tony''.

Munnery featured as a "genius" on Dave Gorman's ''Genius'' show on Radio 4.

Books

* ''Sit-Down Comedy'' (contributor to anthology, ed Malcolm Hardee & John Fleming) Ebury Press/Random House, 2003. ;
* ''How To Live'', P.O.W, 2005. ; Republished by Go Faster Stripe, 2018
* ''Wall & Piece'', (contributor), by Banksy, Century, 2006. ;
* ''You Are Nothing'', (interviewee), by Robert Wringham, Go Faster Stripe, 2012.

Other works

Munnery has several CDs available: ''Alan Parker – Blast From The Past'' (featuring Stewart Lee on guitar and Al Murray on drums), ''Simon Munnery's Experimental'' Half Hour (2 CD's from the Resonance FM radio show of the same name), ''AGM'' recorded live at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2003, and ''BucketHead: Phenomenon Anon And On'' and ''Mr Bartlett & Mr Willis'' (2011) written and co-performed by Kevin Eldon.

In 2007, Simon appeared as Alan Parker on a music track by The Orb called ''Grey Clouds'', a take off of their earlier track ''Little Fluffy Clouds''. It features on the Annie Nightingale album called '' Y4K'' on Distinct'ive Records.

Two DVDs of his work were released in 2007 – the first ''IAMTV'', covering his Perrier Award Nominated show from the 1999 Edinburgh Fringe, was closely followed by ''Hello'' produced by Go Faster Stripe, a more recent stand-up performance.

In the 1990s, he regularly contributed a column to '' NME'' as "Alan Parker: Urban Warrior".

In 2009, Munnery starred in an award-winning animated rotoscope short, titled ''Yellow Belly End'', co-written and directed by Philip Bacon, a student of the National Film and Television School. In the nine-minute film, Munnery appears in a bird costume and contemplates a cliff. He is credited as "Bird".

In 2017, Munnery was interviewed by fellow comedian Stuart Goldsmith for his podcast the ''Comedians Comedian''. They discussed the inspiration for some of Munnery's ground breaking characters amongst other topics.

In 2020, artist Andy Holden curated a retrospective of the artwork of Simon Munnery, tilted ‘What Am I?’ It was first shown at Ex-Baldessarre, Bedford, and then toured to Stroud Valley Art Space.

References

External links

Simon Munnery
– official site
New Statesman
– Munnery's writing for ''The New Statesman'', 2006–2008.
Simon Munnery's Comedy CVResonance FMHow to Live
– Munnery's book at ''First Against the Wall''.
CERN Podcast
– Simon Munnery and Kevin Eldon visit CERN

{{DEFAULTSORT:Munnery, Simon
Alumni of Trinity College, Cambridge
English male comedians
Living people
People educated at Watford Grammar School for Boys
1967 births
20th-century English comedians
21st-century English comedians