Matthew Willetts

Matthew Willetts was born in the West Midlands but was brought up on the Essex / Hertfordshire borders after his parents (Lecturer & Teacher) moved jobs.

He was educated at Middlesex University (B.A.Hons Degree Business Studies & Diploma in Drama) and Cardiff University (Postgraduate in Theatre Studies) where he wrote and appeared in revue shows, performing at the Edinburgh Fringe (1981) and working as assistant director at the Half Moon theatre, becoming involved in two West End transfers one being ‘Destry Rides Again’ Donmor Warehouse (1982). Soon after he became a comedy performer in Cabaret, Theatre and Television, but made a major impact writing on TV shows such as 'Russ Abbot' ‘Bobby Davro’ 'Les Dennis' 'Brian Conley' ‘Rory Bremner’ and 'Jim Tavare'. He has written over 50 TV comedy shows including several programmes abroad (Germany, Sweden, and Holland) ‘Spitting Image’ (German version), a thirteen part situation comedy sit-com series 'Flip' (1991) for the BBC and collected an award for three video's entitled 'Classic Morecambe and Wise' ‘Classic Mike Yarwood’ & ‘Classic Dick Emery’ (1990) and more recently was Executive Producer for the Marcus Brigstocke stand up DVD ‘Planet Corduroy’ (2007) through his own company Comicus Ltd ^[1]. The comedians he has written for and worked with reads like an A-Z of comedy

He has been employed as a comedy consultant to several independent production companies, including a long period with the Walt Disney Organisation (Europe & America) as a cartoon writer on characters such as Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck (1989-91). For 4 years (1987 – 1991) he was a regular judge (Press Jury) at the Montreux Television festival for Light Entertainment further advancing his international credentials. His links with American comedy have always been strong and he was a consultant on ‘The World Stands Up’ (2004) an international stand up comedy series.

In 1997-2003 Matthew became Head of Comedy Production at Jongleurs Comedy clubs where he built a strong reputation for his corporate work producing major sponsored theatre tours, Edinburgh festival (1998), TV projects and booking large corporate events, working with leading blue chip brands and artistes ^[2]. His considerable success in this area was recognised by an outstanding achievement award by ‘Club Mirror’ and won the best creative campaign award by ‘Marketing’ magazine for the development and production of a blue chip branded Comedy tour which reinvented an established brand ^[3]. In 2004 he started up Comicus Ltd a specialist comedy agency and consultancy for corporate clients. Soon after, Matthew’s innovation continued by being the first person to regularly block book modern style comedy club comedians on to traditional cruise ships. Over the last 5 years a total of nine international ships have benefited from these shows. His knowledge of the comedy business has always been respected and he is sometimes heard on Radio and seen on TV discussing such matters. In 2006 he was asked to teach and help develop the first comedy BA degree course at Southampton Solent University where he teaches Comedy Writing (part time) ^[4] along side being a active director of Comicus Ltd.

References

1. ^ http://www.imdb.com/name/nm3005349/
2. ^ http://www.agents-uk.com/agent.aspx?ID=618&back=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.agents-uk.com%2FFind_An_Agent.aspx%3Farea%3D10
3. ^ http://www.comicus.co.uk/general/about.asp
4. ^ http://www.solent.ac.uk/courses/undergraduate/comedy_writing_and_performance_ba/course_details.aspx

External links

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