Tuesday 11 June 2019

JAMES HUGH CALUM LAURIE, THE ENGLISH PERSONALITY

Hugh Laurie
Today, The Grandma has decided to stay at home watching TV. She has decided to enjoy a marathon of Hugh Laurie's films to homage him on his birthday. The Grandma loves British culture, especially Literature and Theatre, and Hugh Laurie is one of the most interesting British actors nowadays.

James Hugh Calum Laurie was born on 11 June 1959 in Blackbird Leys, Oxfordshire, the youngest of four children of Patricia and William George Ranald Mundell "Ran" Laurie, who was a physician and winner of an Olympic gold medal in the coxless pairs, rowing, at the 1948 London Games.

Laurie first gained recognition for his work as one half of the comedy double act Fry and Laurie with his friend and comedy partner Stephen Fry, whom he met through their mutual friend Emma Thompson whilst attending Cambridge University, where Laurie was president of the Cambridge Footlights. The duo acted together in a number of projects during the 1980s and 1990s, including the sketch comedy series A Bit of Fry & Laurie and the P. G. Wodehouse adaptation Jeeves and Wooster.

Hugh Laurie
Laurie's other roles during the period include the period comedy series Blackadder, in which Fry also appeared, and the films Sense and Sensibility, 101 Dalmatians, The Borrowers and Stuart Little.

Laurie portrayed the title character in the U.S. medical drama series House (2004–12) on Fox, for which he won two Golden Globe Awards.

Laurie portrayed the antagonist Richard Onslow Roper in the miniseries The Night Manager, for which he won his third Golden Globe Award, and Senator Tom James in the HBO sitcom Veep, for which he received his 10th Emmy Award nomination. He also played the lead role of forensic psychiatrist Dr. Eldon Chance in the Hulu series Chance (2016–17).

Outside acting, Laurie has released two blues albums, Let Them Talk (2011) and Didn't It Rain (2013), both to favourable reviews, and has authored a novel, The Gun Seller, published in 1996. Among his honours, Laurie has won three Golden Globe Awards, two Screen Actors Guild Awards and has been nominated for ten Primetime Emmy Awards. He received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2016.

He was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2007 New Year Honours and Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2018 New Year Honours, both for services to drama.

More information: @hughlaurie

Forced to abandon rowing during a bout of glandular fever, Laurie joined the Cambridge Footlights, a university dramatic club that has produced many well-known actors and comedians. There he met Emma Thompson, with whom he had a romantic relationship; the two remain good friends. She introduced him to his future comedy partner, Stephen Fry.

Laurie, Fry and Thompson later parodied themselves as the University Challenge representatives of Footlights College, Oxbridge in Bambi, an episode of The Young Ones, with the series' co-writer Ben Elton completing their team.

Stephen Fry & Hugh Laurie
Fry and Laurie went on to work together on various projects throughout the 1980s and 1990s. Among them were the Blackadder series, written by Ben Elton and Richard Curtis, starring Rowan Atkinson, with Laurie in various roles, including Prince George and Lieutenant George.

Laurie's later film appearances include Sense and Sensibility (1995), adapted by and starring Emma Thompson; the Disney live-action film 101 Dalmatians (1996), where he played Jasper, one of the bumbling criminals hired to kidnap the puppies; Elton's adaptation of his novel Inconceivable, Maybe Baby (2000); Girl from Rio; the 2004 remake of The Flight of the Phoenix, and Stuart Little.

Between 2004 and 2012 he starred as an acerbic physician specialising in diagnostic medicine, Dr. Gregory House in the Fox medical drama House. For his portrayal, Laurie assumed an American accent.

More information: SAGA

In August 2007, Laurie appeared on BBC Four's documentary Stephen Fry: 50 Not Out, filmed in celebration of Fry's 50th birthday.

In 2008, he took part in Blackadder Rides Again and appeared as Captain James Biggs in Street Kings, opposite Keanu Reeves and Forest Whitaker, and then in 2009 as the eccentric Dr. Cockroach, PhD in DreamWorks' Monsters vs. Aliens. He also hosted Saturday Night Live for the second time on the Christmas show in which he sang a medley of three-second Christmas songs to close his monologue.

Laurie played Richard Onslow Roper in the BBC 1 mini-series The Night Manager. The series started filming in spring 2015 and aired first on the BBC. He was nominated for two Emmys for his work on the miniseries and won the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor-Series, Miniseries or Television Film.

In 2019 Laurie appeared in Veep creator Iannucci film The Personal History of David Copperfield an adaptation of the novel David Copperfield by Charles Dickens. That same year announced he would also work with Iannucci on the upcoming space comedy Avenue 5 for HBO.

More information: Fact Fiend


Screenwriting is the most prized of all the cinematic arts.
Actually, it isn't, but it should be.

Hugh Laurie

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