| John Sessions | |
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 Sessions in the 1990 film Sweet Revenge |
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| Born | 11 January 1953  Largs, North Ayrshire, Scotland |
John Sessions (born 11 January 1953) is a Scottish actor and comedian. Events 1055 - Theodora is crowned Empress of the Byzantine Empire. Year 1953 ( MCMLIII) was a Common year starting on Thursday (link will display full calendar of the Gregorian calendar. Largs is a Town on the Firth of Clyde in North Ayrshire, Scotland, about 33 miles (53 km from Glasgow. North Ayrshire ( Gaelic: Siorrachd Inbhir Àir a Tuath, ʃir̴əxg̊ iɲiɾʲˈaːɾʲ ə t̪uə is one of 32 council areas of Scotland. Scotland ( Gaelic: Alba) is a Country in northwest Europethat occupies the northern third of the island of Great Britain. Events 1055 - Theodora is crowned Empress of the Byzantine Empire. Year 1953 ( MCMLIII) was a Common year starting on Thursday (link will display full calendar of the Gregorian calendar. Scotland ( Gaelic: Alba) is a Country in northwest Europethat occupies the northern third of the island of Great Britain. An actor, actress, player or thespian (see terminology) is a person who Acts in a Dramatic production and who works A comedian or comic is a person who seeks to entertain an audience primarily by making them laugh He is known for comedy improvisation in television shows such as Whose Line Is It Anyway?; as a panelist on QI and as a character actor in numerous films, both in Britain and Hollywood. Whose Line Is It Anyway? (abbreviated to Whose Line? or WLIIA) was a short-form Improvisational comedy TV show In traditional Chinese culture, qi (zh [[wikt氣 氣]] Pinyin qì, Wade-Giles ch'i Jyutping
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Early life
Sessions was born John Gibb Marshall in Largs, North Ayrshire and spent some of his earliest years in Kempston, Bedford and St Albans, Hertfordshire. Largs is a Town on the Firth of Clyde in North Ayrshire, Scotland, about 33 miles (53 km from Glasgow. North Ayrshire ( Gaelic: Siorrachd Inbhir Àir a Tuath, ʃir̴əxg̊ iɲiɾʲˈaːɾʲ ə t̪uə is one of 32 council areas of Scotland. Bedford is the County town of Bedfordshire, England. It is a large town and the administrative centre for the Bedford borough St Albans is the main urban area of the City and District of St Albans in southern Hertfordshire, England, around north of central London. Hertfordshire (ˈhɑːtfədʃə(r, abbreviated Herts) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the East region of He changed his name when he became a performer as there was already a John Marshall on the Equity register. Equity (formerly British Actors' Equity Association) is the Actors Trade union in the United Kingdom He graduated with an MA in English literature from the University of Wales and later studied for a PhD from McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, although (contrary to common assumption for many years) he did not complete the doctorate. The University of Wales ( Prifysgol Cymru in Welsh) is a confederal University founded in 1893. McMaster redirects here for others see McMaster (disambiguation. Ontario (ɒnˈtɛrioʊ is a province located in the central part of Canada, the largest by population and second largest after Quebec Country to "Dominion of Canada" or "Canadian Federation" or anything else please read the Talk Page [1] From later interviews and references in his work it appears this latter period was an unhappy one: in a 'Worst of Times' column for The Independent around 1990 he talked of how the freezing Canadian weather had depressed him, he was smoking 'far too many cigarettes' and 'had a couple of disastrous flings' and described his PhD dissertation as '200 pages of rubbish'. The Independent is a British compact Newspaper published by Tony O'Reilly 's Independent News & Media. Nonetheless he began to make appearances to small audiences with his comedy there.
Career
He attended RADA and in the early 1980s worked on the small venue comedy circuit with largely improvised freewheeling fantasy monologues. The Royal Academy of Dramatic Art ( RADA) in Bloomsbury, London, is generally regarded as one of the most prestigious Drama schools in the world He topped a double bill with French and Saunders at times. French & Saunders is a British Sketch comedy Television show written by and staring BAFTA Award -nominee Dawn French He had a number of small parts in films including The Sender (1982), The Bounty (1984, which also starred Mel Gibson, Anthony Hopkins and Laurence Olivier) and Castaway (1986). The Sender is a 1982 Horror film directed by Roger Christian and written by Thomas Baum. The Bounty is a 1984 Historical film made by Dino De Laurentiis Productions and distributed by Orion Pictures Corporation and Mel Columcille Gerard Gibson, AO (born January 3 1956 Sir Philip Anthony Hopkins, CBE (born 31 December 1937 is a Welsh Film, stage and Television Actor. Laurence Kerr Olivier Baron Castaway is a 1986 film starring Amanda Donohoe and Oliver Reed, and directed by Nicolas Roeg. Not appearing particularly comfortable in these roles however, he played to his strengths in improvisation and comedy with his one-man stage show Napoleon, which ran in London's West End for some time in the mid-1980s. Sessions and Stephen Fry were the only two regular panellists on the original radio broadcast of Whose Line Is It Anyway? in the late 1980s. Stephen John Fry (born 24 August 1957 is an English Humorist, Writer, Wit, Actor, Novelist, filmmaker Whose Line Is It Anyway? (abbreviated to Whose Line? or WLIIA) was a short-form Improvisational comedy TV show When the show, still hosted by Clive Anderson, made the transition to television, Fry departed from regular appearances, but Sessions remained the featured panellist for the first season, a frequent player in the second, but he did not appear again after his two appearances in the third series. Clive Anderson (born 10 December 1952) is a former Barrister, now famous for being a successful Comedy writer as well as a A gifted impressionist (he also voiced characters for Spitting Image), he drew heavily on his extensive literary education and developed a reputation for being "a bit of a swot", being able to quote extensive passages of text and make endless cultural and historical references. Spitting Image was a British satirical Puppet show that ran on the ITV television network from 1984 to 1996 His ready ability to switch between accents and personae meanwhile allowed his career in improvisation to flourish.
In 1989, he starred in his own one-man TV show, John Sessions. Filmed at the Donmar Warehouse in London, the show involved Sessions performing before a live audience who were invited to nominate a person, a location and two objects from a selection, around which Sessions would improvise a surreal performance for the next half hour. Donmar Warehouse is a small not for profit Theatre in the Covent Garden area of the London Borough of Camden, with seating for 250 playgoers This series prompted two further one-man TV shows: John Sessions' Tall Tales (1991) and John Sessions' Likely Stories (1994), although these were increasingly pre-planned rather than improvised: in an interview headlined 'Who The Hell Does John Sessions Think He Is?' in Q magazine in the early 1990s, he admitted that some of his improv wasn't entirely spontaneous but that if it were advertised as scripted 'it had to be funnier'. Q is a Music Magazine published monthly in the United Kingdom, with a circulation of 130179 as of June 2007 Ultimately Sessions grew weary of this kind of performance (as did the viewing public). More successful was Stella Street (1997 to present), a surreal "soap opera" comedy about a fantasy suburban British street inhabited by celebrities like Michael Caine and Al Pacino, which he conceived with fellow impressionist Phil Cornwell, the two of them playing several parts in each episode. Stella Street was a British Television Comedy programme originally screened on BBC2 (1997 - 2001 Sir Maurice Joseph Micklewhite Jr, CBE (born 14 March 1933 better known by his screen name Michael Caine, is an Oscar - and BAFTA Alfredo James “Al” Pacino (born April 25 1940 is an Academy - BAFTA - Golden Globe - Emmy - & Screen Actors Guild Award-Winning Phil Cornwell (born 5 October 1957 in Southend-on-Sea, Essex) is an English Comedian, Actor, impressionist
Increasingly Sessions has returned to formal acting, with parts ranging from James Boswell (to Robbie Coltrane's Samuel Johnson) in the UK TV series Boswell and Johnson's Tour of the Western Isles (1993) to Doctor Prunesquallor in the BBC adaptation of Gormenghast (2000). James Boswell 9th Laird of Auchinleck ( October 29, 1740 - May 19, 1795) was a lawyer diarist and Author born in Edinburgh Robbie Coltrane, OBE (born 30 March 1950) is a Scottish Actor, comedian and author Samuel Johnson (often referred to as Dr Johnson) (18 September He has also appeared in some Shakespeare films, playing Macmorris in Kenneth Branagh's Henry V (1989), Philostrate in the 1999 film of A Midsummer Night's Dream, and Salerio in 2004's The Merchant of Venice, with Al Pacino and Jeremy Irons. William Shakespeare ( baptised Kenneth Charles Branagh (born 10 December 1960) is an Emmy Award -winning Academy Award -nominated Northern Irish Actor Henry V is a 1989 film directed by Kenneth Branagh, and based upon the Shakespeare play about the famous English King A Midsummer Night's Dream is a romantic comedy by William Shakespeare, suggested by " The Knight's Tale " from The Merchant of Venice is a 2004 movie based on Shakespeare 's play of the same name. Alfredo James “Al” Pacino (born April 25 1940 is an Academy - BAFTA - Golden Globe - Emmy - & Screen Actors Guild Award-Winning Jeremy John Irons (born September 19 1948) is an English film television and stage Actor.
In between appearing in regular film and TV roles Sessions has made appearances on Have I Got News for You and, more recently, as a semi-regular panellist on QI. Have I Got News for You is a British television panel show produced by Hat Trick Productions for the BBC. In traditional Chinese culture, qi (zh [[wikt氣 氣]] Pinyin qì, Wade-Giles ch'i Jyutping Sessions was one of four panellists, including the permanent Alan Davies, on the inaugural episode of QI, in which he demonstrated his effortless memory of the birth and death dates of various historical figures (while simultaneously and apologetically deeming the knowledge of such facts "a sickness"). Alan Davies (born 6 March 1966) is an English comedian, Writer and Actor, best known for starring as Jonathan
On radio, Sessions guested in December 1997 on the regular BBC Radio 3 show Private Passions, presented by Michael Berkeley, not as himself but as a 112-year-old Viennese percussionist called Manfred Sturmer, who told anecdotes (about Brahms, Clara Schumann, Richard Strauss, Arnold Schoenberg and others) so realistically that some listeners did not realise that the whole thing was a hoax. Private Passions is a weekly music discussion programme which has been running for over 10 years on BBC Radio 3, presented by the composer Michael Berkeley Michael Berkeley (born 29 May 1948) is a British composer and broadcaster on music Johannes Brahms ( pronounced ˈbʁaːms (May 7 1833 &ndash April 3 1897 was a German Composer Clara Josephine Wieck Schumann (September 13 1819 &ndash May 20 1896 was a German musician one of the most distinguished Pianists of the Romantic era, as Richard Georg Strauss (11 June 1864 &ndash 8 September 1949 was a German Composer of the late Romantic era and early modern era particularly noted Arnold Schoenberg ( pronounced ˈʃøːnbɛrk (13 September 1874 &ndash 13 July 1951 was an Austrian and later American Composer, associated with A hoax is a deliberate attempt to Dupe, Deceive or trick an audience into believing or accepting that something is real when in fact it is not or that Other Sessions creations appeared on Berkeley's show in subsequent years. Also since the demise of Willie Rushton Sessions has taken the role of narrating the popular Asterix stories for audio book. William George Rushton, commonly known as Willie Rushton ( 18 August, 1937 in Chelsea London – 11 December, 1996 Cromwell The Adventures of Asterix ( French: Astérix or Astérix le Gaulois) is a series of French
Sessions made a guest appearance in a special webcast version of Doctor Who, in a story called Death Comes to Time, in which he played General Tannis. Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. Death Comes to Time is a Webcast audio drama based on the long-running British Science fiction Television series Doctor He also appears in the BBC series Judge John Deed as barrister Brian Cantwell on an occasional basis. Judge John Deed is a British Legal drama television series produced by the BBC in association with One-Eyed Dog for BBC One. In 2007 he guest-starred in the Doctor Who audio adventure 100.
In 2006 he presented some of the BBC's coverage of The Proms, and featured in one of the two Jackanory specials, voicing the characters and playing the storyteller in the audiobook version of Paul Stewart and Chris Riddell's children's book Muddle Earth. The Proms, more formally known as The BBC Proms, or The Henry Wood Promenade Concerts presented by the BBC, is an eight-week summer season of daily Orchestral Jackanory is a long-running BBC Children's television series that was designed to stimulate an interest in reading. Paul Stewart (born 4 June, 1955) is a writer of children's books, best known for the bestselling The Edge Chronicles, the Free Lance Chris Riddell (born 1962) is a British Illustrator (and occasional writer of Children's literature, and a political cartoonist for Children's literature is an age category of literature written for published for or marketed to Children roughly through age 12 Muddle Earth is a children's book by Paul Stewart, published in 2003 and illustrated by Chris Riddell. In 2007 he appeared in the final episode of the second series of Hotel Babylon, playing a hotel owner, Donovan Credo. Hotel Babylon is a BBC television drama series based on the book of the same name by Imogen Edwards-Jones, first shown in January 2006
References
- ^ “John Sessions”, Penguin Books: Authors, <http://www.penguin.ca/nf/Author/AuthorPage/0,,1000061985,00.html?sym=QUE>. Penguin Books is a British Publisher founded in 1935 by Allen Lane. Retrieved on 2007-09-05. Year 2007 ( MMVII) was a Common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. Events 1590 - Alexander Farnese 's army forces Henry IV of France to raise the siege of Paris.
External links
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