Matt Berry Biography

Matthew Charles Berry (born 2 May 1974) is an English actor, writer, and musician. He is best known for his leading role as Steven Toast in the Channel 4 British sitcom Toast of London. He is also well known for his appearances in The IT Crowd, Garth Marenghi's Darkplace, The Mighty Boosh, Snuff Box, and The Wrong Door. He plays Beef in House of Fools. He also starred in and composed AD/BC: A Rock Opera. In 2015 he won a BAFTA award in Best Male Performance for his work on Toast of London.

He has voiced several advertisements, most notably for Volvic, The Natural Confectionery Company, Absolute Radio and Moneysupermarket.com. He has regularly worked closely with The Mighty Boosh and other associated actors such as Richard Ayoade and is known for playing eccentric, flamboyant, woman-obsessed characters.

Early life and education

Berry was born in Bromham, Bedfordshire, to Pauline (ne Acreman) and Charles Berry. He has one older sister, Johanna. He attended Nottingham Trent University, where he received a BA in Contemporary Arts in 1997.

Career

He began his career as a runner before appearing in the video game magazine show Game Over on BSkyB's computer and technology channel .tv, between 1998 and 1999. Though commissioned as an editorial show on the subject matter, episodes contained a large number of comedy sketches with Berry as the main performer. These showcased a wide range of characters, one of which was a sketch about The Exorcist entitled "Fear Pushed Through the Ring". It was this sketch and others like it that resulted in Berry, and producers Rik Henderson and Richard Pitt, being fired from the show.

Berry's first prominent TV role was playing Todd Rivers/Dr Lucien Sanchez in the cult 2004 comedy series Garth Marenghi's Darkplace and the 2006 spin-off Man to Man with Dean Learner. He later appeared as the eccentric and sinister tycoon/explorer Dixon Bainbridge in The Mighty Boosh. Berry first met The Mighty Boosh duo while performing at the Hen and Chickens Theatre, where they were resident in 2000. He can be seen in a cameo performance in The Mighty Boosh Live DVD.

Berry wrote and starred in the comedy show Snuff Box on BBC Three with Rich Fulcher, whom he met during the filming of the first series of The Mighty Boosh. Fulcher co-starred as Bainbridge's lackey, Bob Fossil. Berry starred as Douglas Reynholm since the second series of The IT Crowd. He was nominated as Best Male Comedy Newcomer in the 2007 British Comedy Awards for this role, but lost out to James Corden for Gavin & Stacey.

In November 2007, Berry starred alongside Simon Farnaby and Boosh regular Rich Fulcher in The Golf War on E4. Film appearances include The Devil's Chair (2006) and Moon (2009). In 2008 he became the face of Adult Swim's spoof charity appeal "Save the Workers". Berry featured in Season 2, episode 15 of The Sarah Silverman Program, filmed in Los Angeles for Comedy Central. Berry stars in the video (directed by Richard Ayoade) for the 2007 Super Furry Animals song "Run-Away". He also appeared as an antiques expert in the ITV sketch show Monkey Trousers with Vic and Bob and Steve Coogan.

In 2010, Berry played journalist Michael Duffy in the BBC production Five Daughters, which portrayed events surrounding the Ipswich murders of 2006. Berry starred in a short film called The Search"?"a lonely man's search for the existence of life outside our universe takes a remarkable turn when he connects with a recently bereaved family". In 2011, he provided the voice of Allen in the Aqua Teen Hunger Force episode "Allen Part Two". He appeared as a contestant in the British comedy panel game Shooting Stars, acting the part of Vangelis.

In 2012, BBC Radio 4 aired his comedy series I, Regress. In it he takes on the role of Dr Berry, a brilliant but unorthodox regressive therapist. During each 15-minute episode, Berry explores the psyche of a guest patient, attempting to treat his or her problems in surreal dreamlike sequences. Berry appeared in the film adaptation of the David Nicholls novel One Day, playing the role of Aaron, Dexter's agent. He briefly featured in the closing ceremony of the London 2012 Olympics, introducing ELO's "Mr. Blue Sky" by way of a mock weather forecast.

In July 2012, he appeared as vainglorious actor Steven Toast in the pilot episode of Channel 4 sitcom Toast of London, co-written with Arthur Mathews. Notwithstanding mixed reviews, a series was commissioned. The first episode was broadcast on 20 October 2013. On 10 May 2015 Berry won a BAFTA award for Best Male Comedy Performance in the series Toast of London. In 2015, Matt Berry and Arthur Mathews published "Toast on Toast: Cautionary tales and candid advice", a spoof autobiography of Steven Toast. It was also released as an audio book read by Matt Berry.

Berry played the title character in the 2013 Portlandia episode "Squiggleman."

In 2014, Berry appeared in the BBC 2 series House of Fools, written by and starring Reeves and Mortimer.

Matt Berry appears in episode nine of the sixth season of Dan Harmon's television series Community, released on Yahoo Screen on 5 May 2015. Berry appeared in the second SpongeBob SquarePants feature film, The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water, where he voiced a dolphin, Bubbles. On 18 May 2015 Berry appeared in "Twelve Forever", a pilot created by Julia Vickerman and released on Cartoon Network's website, where he voiced the main villainess "The Butt Witch". Berry made an appearance as Professor Teacher in two episodes of Major Lazer. Berry narrated the BBC series Matt Berry Does, which was broadcast from April 2015 to January 2016. In December 2015, he played Professor Awfulshirt in Harry Hill in Professor Branestawm Returns on BBC One.

Voiceovers

Berry has provided many voiceovers for both radio and television advertising, including Absolute Radio, Volvic mineral water, Mller Corner adverts and characters on several adverts for The Natural Confectionery Company. He has also been in the sketch show The Wrong Door as a recurring bit-part character who runs into a snooker hall and shouts "Stop playing snooker!" before whispering an implied impossible wager to one of the players and completing an unfeasible trick shot. In 2012 he worked with Team17 on their video game title Worms Revolution, providing voice over, as fictional wildlife documentary maker Don Keystone, for both the game and the video advertisements produced for it. In 2014 he read out the teamsheets at Luton Town before the game. In 2015, he provided the voice for an award-winning satirical anti-war film by the UK branch of Veterans for Peace called 'Action Man: Battlefield Casualties'.

Music

Berry composed all the music for Snuff Box and Toast of London, as well as the music for AD/BC: A Rock Opera, which he co-wrote with Richard Ayoade. AD/BC was a half-hour parody of overblown musicals in general and Jesus Christ Superstar in particular, telling the story of the innkeeper who allowed Mary, Joseph, and the baby Jesus to sleep in his manger. AD/BC was broadcast in December 2004 and featured Fulcher and Mighty Boosh stars Julian Barratt and Noel Fielding. He also performed a song for an episode of Garth Marenghi's Darkplace entitled "One Track Lover", a spoof of cheesy romantic 80s songs.

Berry also wrote music for the BBC 2 Steve Coogan comedy Saxondale and appeared in the first and third episodes of the second series of the show. He composed the theme song for the Channel 4 sketch show Blunder. He is also credited on The Peter Serafinowicz Show.

Berry has released six studio albums: Jackpot (1995), Opium (self-released, 2008), Witchazel (Acid Jazz Records, 2011), Kill the Wolf (2013), Music for Insomniacs (2014) and The Small Hours (2017). He stated in the first issue of Bearded Magazine in 2007 that he was producing and collaborating on new material with 1960s soul singer Geno Washington and was to record a new album. This would become Witchazel, which Berry originally released as a one-day only free download in March 2009. The album was later officially released as a CD and paid-for digital download.

Berry has toured with a number of bands including Jonas 3 and The Maypoles. The latter comprises former Bluetones singer Mark Morriss and Singer/Clarinet player Cecilia Fage. Rich Fulcher has joined Berry on stage for several appearances. Geno Washington has also joined Berry onstage at London gigs for encores of the Snuff Box theme.

In October 2007, Berry provided a brand new track "Cream Pie" to Bearded Magazine for readers to download for free, followed by a cover of the Blur song "Sing" in November 2007. "Cream Pie" is still available to supporters of Beardaid.

Berry voiced his appreciation of the television themes of Ronnie Hazlehurst in an episode of Charlie Brooker's Screenwipe, and his band played out the Screenwipe Christmas special with a rendition of Hazlehurst's theme tune for 1980s British sitcom Sorry!.

Until 2010, Berry presented a show on Absolute Radio, where he still performs various voiceovers and is described as "the voice of Absolute Radio". The now-defunct Matt Berry Podcast regularly featured in the Top Ten of the iTunes podcast chart, and its producer Vince Lynch was nominated for Best Online Producer at the Radio Production Awards.

In 2011, he appeared in the music video for "Reset", a song from Route One or Die, the debut album from London-based experimental band Three Trapped Tigers.

In 2012, part of the Snuff Box theme appeared briefly in the film Dredd, the line "but it was bronze" playing from a computer terminal in the Grand Hall of Justice in the latter half of the film.

In 2015, he was the opening act for Steven Wilson's second Royal Albert Hall concert.

In 2017 he appears in the Pugwash music video for What Are You Like, though he does not perform on the recording.

Filmography

Film

Year	Title	Role	Director(s)	Notes
2007	The Devil's Chair	Brett Wilson	Adam Mason
2009	Moon	Overmeyers	Duncan Jones
	A Bit of Tom Jones?	Philip da Purve	Peter Watkins-Hughes
2010	Huge	Head Creative	Ben Miller
	Braincell	Neil Balsam	Alex Birrell
2011	One Day	Aaron	Lone Scherfig
	Angry White Man	Bulldog Hayes	Brian O'Connell
2012	Snow White and the Huntsman	Percy	Rupert Sanders
	The Wedding Video	Roger	Nigel Cole
2013	Svengali	Jeremy Braines	John Hardwick
2014	Asterix and Obelix: Mansion of the Gods	Vitalstatistix	Alexandre Astier & Louis Clichy	Voice; English dub
2015	The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water	Bubbles	Mike Mitchell & Paul Tibbitt	Voice
	Swansong	Toby Taylor	Douglas Ray
2018	An Evening with Beverly Luff Linn	Rodney von Donkensteige	Jim Hosking	In Post-production

Television

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2004	Garth Marenghi's Darkplace	Todd Rivers/Dr. Lucien Sanchez	6 episodes
	The Mighty Boosh	Dixon Bainbridge	4 episodes
2006	Snuff Box	Matt/Various characters	6 episodes
	Man to Man with Dean Learner	Various characters	5 episodes
	Saxondale	Geoff	2 episodes
2007	The Peter Serafinowicz Show	Various characters	2 episodes
2007-13	The IT Crowd	Douglas Reynholm	17 episodes
2008	The Wrong Door	Various characters	3 episodes
2008-09	The Sarah Silverman Program	Sir Corin Ashley/ Owl	2 episodes
2010	The Suits	Voice	1 episode
	Five Daughters	Mirror Journalist	1 episode
2011	Duckworth	Turk Cinnamon	1 episode
	Aqua Teen Hunger Force	Allen (Voice)	1 episode
	Shooting Stars (TV series)	Vangelis	1 episode
2012-15	Toast of London	Steven Toast	19 episodes
2013	Portlandia	Squiggleman	1 episode
	It's Kevin	Sex Pistol	1 episode
2014	Lucas Bros. Moving Co.	OG Sherlock Kush	1 episode
2014-15	House of Fools (TV series)	Beef	13 episodes
2015	Community (TV series)	Grifting Professor	1 episode
	Major Lazer	Professor Teacher (Voice)	2 episodes
	Harvey Beaks	Doctor Roberts	4 episodes
2016	Morgana Robinson's The Agency	Tony	1 episode