Simon Munnery

Simon Munnery, also known by his stagenames of Alan Parker: Urban Warrior and The League Against Tedium, is an English comedy writer and experimental standup 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.

Munnery's experimental style is reflected in his on-stage appearance: his unfashionable glasses, homemade clothes (or clothes apparently donated to him by comedian Jeff Green), makeshift props, and dramatic facial hair. As 'The League' he often wears a hat crafted from a kettle, and one of his stand-up shows has a character who performs with a metal bucket over his head.

His stand-up is often satirical, often political and almost always surreal. Munnery plays harmonica and his dialogue is full of quotable remarks.

tand-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 the talents of Stewart Lee, Kevin Eldon, Sally Phillips, Johnny Vegas, Julian Barratt, Roger Mann, Jason Freeman and the music of Richard Thomas and Lori Lixenberg. A television pilot was made of "Cluub Z" for Channel 4 in 1996, but was never broadcast.

Some recent Munnery Edinburgh Fringe shows include "Trilogy", "Buckethead" and "Simon Munnery's Annual General Meeting". Also, Munnery can still be seen at small venues, where his poetry usually takes precedence.

His 2006 Edinburgh Fringe show, "AGM", includes the opportunity for the audience to raise questions to discuss as group (such as "is there a God?"). The experience often continues after the show, when he takes the audience on tours around town, taking in art galleries, drinks and visits to other shows. He describes such events as jumping the divide between "unfunny comedy" and "shit art".

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 (Lori 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 (Lori Lixenberg), a sedated vampire (Richard Thomas), and a monkey (Munnery's wife Janet).

Radio

During the 1990s he made several series for BBC Radio 1, one based on his League Against Tedium character. Others were based on his Alan Parker character, including "Alan Parker", "Alan Parker's 59 Minutes of Truth", and "Alan Parker, Road Warrior".

Recently, Munnery has returned to radio, 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. His latest television appearance was on the BBC Three show, The Comic Side of 7 Days.

Munnery also was the special guest on the pilot episode of a new BBC Radio 4 show called New World Order, which was recorded at the BBC Radio Theatre in June 2008. In the show Munnery took on the role of the Supreme Leader of the new world. During the show, he was interviewed by Danny Wallace about his 3 commandments. These were, 1. Wash, 2. Talk to people, not about them, 3. Love One An Other.

Books

* "Sit-Down Comedy" (contributor to anthology, ed Malcolm Hardee & John Fleming) Ebury Press/Random House, 2003. ISBN-10: 0091889243; ISBN-13: 978-0091889241
* "How To Live", P.O.W, 2005. ISBN-10: 0955194628; ISBN-13: 978-0955194627
* "Wall & Piece", (contributor), by Banksy, Century, 2006. ISBN-10: 1844137872; ISBN-13: 978-1844137879

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 (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".

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.

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 DVD's of his work were released in 2007 - "IAMTV", covering his the Perrier Award Nominated show from the 1999 Edinburgh Fringe, and "Hello", a more recent stand-up performance.

External links

* [http://www.leagueagainsttedium.co.uk League Against Tedium] - semi-official site
* [http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/simon-munnery New Statesman Blog] - Munnery's blog at "The New Statesman".
* [http://www.comedycv.co.uk/simonmunnery Simon Munnery's Comedy CV]
* [http://www.resonancefm.com/ Resonance FM]
* [http://www.picturesonwalls.com/books.php?aid=26 How to Live] - Munnery's book at "First Against the Wall".
* [http://www.cernpodcast.com/?p=14 CERN Podcast] - Simon Munnery and Kevin Eldon visit CERN