Leigh Francis Net Worth | Search Net Worth Leigh Francis Net Worth Leigh Francis Net Worth is$10 Million VN:F [1.9.22_1171] Rating: 3.0/5 (2 votes cast) VN:F [1.9.22_1171] ? Rating: 2.7/5 (3 votes cast) Leigh Francis net worth: Leigh Francis is a British comedian and actor who has a net worth of $10 million dollars. Born in Beston, Leeds, West Yorkshire, England, Leigh Francis attended the Leeds College of Art where he earned a certification in Graphic Design. He began performing stand-up comedy while in school, and caught the attention of television presenter Davina McCall. At her suggestion, he was invited to join the cast of "Dom & Kirk's Nite O Plenty", which aired for one season in 1996. Throughout the late 90s, he portrayed various comedic characters on such shows as, "Popworld" and "Whatever I Want'. In 2002, he was offered the television job that would make him a household name.

Channel 4 paid him to develop a number of his more popular characters into their own series. The show was called, "Bo! Selecta", and ran for five seasons. He then spun one of his "Bo! Selecta" characters, Keith Lemon, into a successful television franchise. He is currently appearing as Keith Lemon on "Lemon La Vida Loca", a spoof reality series. Leigh Francis (born 30 May 1973) is an English entertainer, best known for creating Channel 4's Bo' Selecta! and portraying Keith Lemon in several ITV shows. Francis was born on 30 May 1973[citation needed] and brought up on a council estate in Old Farnley, Leeds. His father died aged 47 of cancer, and his mother and sister live in Spain. His grandparents were from the Burgenland area of Austria. Francis attended Farnley Park High School (which later changed its name to Farnley Park Maths and Computing College and is now The Farnley Academy), formerly Harrington High School in Leeds. He later studied at the Leeds College of Art and received a qualification in graphic design.

Before making his major television breakthrough, he was discovered and encouraged by television presenter Davina McCall, performing in-role stand up comedy in a Southern comedy club. McCall landed Francis his first television role on Dom and Kirk's Nite O Plenty, where he portrayed Bobby Stark, a man who gives tips on how to win over the ladies. The series aired on Paramount Television from January to July 1996. Francis' second television role was as Barry Gibson, a music paparazzo, featured on the early series of Channel 4's Popworld. Francis also starred as various characters, including Gibson, Keith Lemon and Avid Merrion in the series Whatever I Want, which aired late night on ITV in 2000. Francis lives in Camden Town, London, and on 31 October 2003, at Allerton Castle, North Yorkshire, he married Jill Carter, a beauty therapist. Their adopted son, Bradley was born on 25 July 1998 and their daughter, Matilda, was born in February 2009.

His major TV breakthrough occurred when Channel 4 offered him a ??250,000 deal to produce a series based around his portrayal of television characters, such as his previous roles as Bobby Stark and Barry Gibson, and in 2002, Bo' Selecta! was born. The series featured Francis portraying a series of celebrities by wearing face masks to impersonate them, Leigh Francis Net Worth, 2.7 out of 5 based on 3 ratings Related Posts 'We're just mucking about' | Culture | The Guardian Culture 'We're just mucking about' Bo' Selecta! revels in merciless spoofs of fading stars such as Mel B and Craig David. Fans claim the comedy show is a brilliant dissection of celebrity culture. But, as its creator tells Sam Delaney, the secret of his success is really far simpler Share on Messenger Close Leigh Francis is the real-life human being behind the grotesque latex masks and berserk caricatures on long-running Channel 4 comedy series Bo' Selecta!.

Until recently, he was known almost solely as Avid Merrion, the demented, neck-brace-wearing, Transylvanian celebrity stalker who anchored the show - although he never did so in the same way that Davina McCall anchors Big Brother or Noel Edmonds anchored his House Party. Merrion goes less for cheesy jokes and innocent flirtations and more for crude propositions, devastatingly explicit confessions and, on occasion, the presentation of his own bodily fluids in small containers to unsuspecting guests. Yes, for the past five years, Bo' Selecta! has been about the most puerile and disgusting show you could watch on TV. It's also very, very funny - if, like me, you like that sort of thing. Despite ratings success, a cult following among the young men of Britain and even, three years ago, a Christmas hit single, the jury has always been out on Francis and his array of bizarre alter egos. Adolescent boys may lap up his brand of juvenile insanity but, say the sort of people who take the time to analyse this sort of thing, what exactly is his point? Is he a talented satirist of celebrity culture? An idiot savant? Or just a childish idiot?

Francis puts himself in the latter category: "There's nothing more to what I do than stupid faces and silly voices," he insists. "When the first series came out, a few newspapers and magazines tried to say we were making a clever slur on celebrities. Me and the team who make the show were laughing and saying, 'Look at them thinking we're all highbrow! We're not, we're just mucking about.' " Francis rarely speaks publicly as himself, usually preferring to remain in character as either Merrion or perhaps in the guise of Keith Lemon, a failed businessman and idiotic lothario whom he based loosely on his best friend (whose name is Keith Lemon). He first decided to drop the shtick while promoting his Christmas charity single in 2003, Proper Crimbo. "I was doing it for the Wheatfield Hospice, which is for cancer, and my dad died of cancer," he says. "I thought I couldn't very well sit there as Avid Merrion talking about my dad dying of cancer. Even though I do joke about cancer all the time with my mates.

My mum says, 'I wish you wouldn't do that,' and I say, 'It's just a joke, Mum!' You've got to be able to laugh about everything, because if not you start crying about everything." This is the simplistic rationale that Francis uses to explain, defend and justify all his wildest comedic extremes. It might sound disingenuous, lazy or glib, but it's not contrived. Francis has an authentically straightforward, black-and-white view of life. He's no Peter Cook or Chris Morris, using the comedy tools of the adolescent berk to convey something more meaningful. "I'm just like the people who watch my show," he says. "I'm not deep or intellectual. If something makes people laugh, I'll do it." Francis, 33, is from Leeds. These days he lives in Camden, London, but remains close to his home-town friends, many of whom contribute to the show (providing theme music and animation for the titles, as well as much of the material, via drunken pub sessions). He is down to earth, but not in the studied way that many northern comics turned London starlets are.

He doesn't make a song and dance about the price of cappuccinos or the existence of garlic bread in order to emphasise his Yorkshire roots. He's self-effacing and enthusiastic and jabbers with boyish excitement about the celebrities he has met while making the show. A bit like Avid Merrion, but without all the stuff about sex. "When they told me that Justin Timberlake had agreed to come on the show, I couldn't believe it," he says, eyes rolling around the room in glee. Francis has bright red hair, wears a leather jacket and T-shirt and is very animated. People in the pub we're sitting in keep looking round at him. "I said to the producer: 'I'll believe it when I'm sat in front of him in a hotel room, slapping him round the face with meat!' " Two weeks later, Francis was dressed up as Avid Merrion, sitting in a hotel room in front of Justin Timberlake, slapping him round the face with some processed ham. Timberlake is shown glancing at the camera wearing an expression that's two parts amusement, one part terror. Did he have any idea what he was in for?

"I heard he had seen DVDs of the series, but we never tell the celebrities what's going to happen on the show," say Francis. "And I am always in character while they are there, including before and after filming." Like all Merrion's celebrity encounters, the Timberlake interview (in episode two of the new series) is astonishing in its incongruity. Only more so, because usually Merrion just freaks out people like actor Jennifer Ellison or journalist Matthew Wright, as opposed to one of the world's most famous singers. The new series, Bo' in the USA, sees his cast of characters move to California, where they subject local stars to a brand of mania that had become familiar to most of the UK celebrity circuit. Americans were more expensive to book than Brits, says Francis, but they were worth the extra. In episode one, the model and actress Jenny McCarthy is interviewed by the Bear, a tiny teddy played by Francis with a filthy mouth and the mannerisms of Ronnie Corbett. Usually, the Bear's sexual banter embarrasses his female interviewees. But McCarthy proved the first star able to out-disgust the perverse creature with her own obscene dialogue.

Concerned that viewers might be overfamiliar with the Bear's pornographic routine, Francis was thrilled that his guest had upped the ante. Even for a show going out at 10.50pm (the rest of the series starts at 10.30), it is a shocking moment. "I put that in afterwards because I have a sense that you have to keep pushing things," Francis explains. Pushing the boundaries of good taste is one of the guiding principles of his work. Don't his bosses at Channel 4 ever draw the line? "Usually at things we say rather than things we do," he says. "Like, they didn't like the stuff we'd written about Tom Cruise because he'd already had water squirted in his face by another Channel 4 show [Balls of Steel] and had his eye on the channel thinking, 'I'm gonna get you one day.' So they asked us to drop that and we did. And Michael Jackson's a tricky one too. We did a sketch where I was Michael Jackson teaching a load of obese kids in a fitness class.

There was a moment where I got them all to touch their toes and was told that I couldn't stand behind them, only in front." He feels that Channel 4 are lenient with him on a false premise: they think he's being clever. "Channel 4 are totally confused," he says. "They're always talking about the 'clever spin' I put on stuff. They think there's a theory behind it all. But the simple truth is that me and Ben [Palmer, his director] get pissed, then I do stupid voices, we laugh and say, 'Let's put that in the show!' " Does he draw a line anywhere? "I don't want to offend people, to be honest," he says. "I didn't like it that Craig David got pissed off and I don't want him thinking about me, 'That wanker ruined my career.' " Francis wears an enormous rubber mask to portray singer David as a simple-minded Yorkshireman with a pet kestrel. "A lot of people think I ruined him. But I don't write his songs - he does." Francis cannot fathom how anyone could find a show so far removed from reality offensive. "It's like a live-action cartoon," he says.

"Usually I have an idea for a character and then I think, 'Who could it be? What if Craig David wasn't a UK garage sensation but actually Billy Casper from the movie Kes?' You make up a character, then you give that character a celebrity identity and people get into it quicker. People think I'm trying to rib celebrities and bring them down, but I'm not. A lot of them are characters that I used to do years ago but couldn't get on telly until I dressed them up as famous people." Prior to his first series in 2002, Francis had spent seven years working in television, trying to get his own show. He had appeared as a host on the children's channel Nickelodeon, performed skits on the Paramount channel (where he also had a spell as a prop man for David Walliams and Matt Lucas), and performed a cameo role on Channel 4's Popworld. "The character I played on Popworld was called Barry Gibson and was exactly the same as the Bear," he says. "One day they just sacked me without telling me. They said they didn't like the character. Then I brought him back dressed as a teddy bear on Bo' Selecta!

and suddenly they thought it was hilarious!" It was only when his agent told him to focus on his character acting that he finally found success. "He said, 'I saw you presenting on TV and I thought you were shit. But I like your characters. Why don't you stick to them?' " he recalls. "I said, 'If you can guarantee me the same money for just doing the character stuff, then you're on.'" Francis and his agent spent over a year having meetings with production companies and broadcasters - all of which Francis attended in character as Avid Merrion. Eventually, Channel 4 gave him his break in 2002. "It was a time when Heat magazine was at its peak and celebrity culture was the new thing everyone was talking about," he says. "I was looking for an idea that would tie in with that and my brother-in-law said, 'Why don't you do something with your masks? That's funny.' So we sat down together and thought of 33 ideas for weird characters. Stuff like, what if Michael Jackson was this badass from the Bronx?" His portrayal of Jackson quickly became one of his most popular - and most contentious.

There is a sense that his portrayal of black characters is based not on random absurdities, but negative racial stereotypes. Jackson the jive-talking buffoon; Trisha Goddard, with her broad west Indian accent, teeth-kissing and catchphrase "rice and peas"; and, in the latest series, Oprah Winfrey, with her southern drawl and requests for fried chicken. Can he see how this could be offensive? "No. Michael Jackson isn't anything like the way I portray him in the show. Oprah Winfrey doesn't talk anything like the way I do her in the show. I don't make that connection. There are real people who do the rice-and-peas stuff and I got that from some of my black friends - that's why I do it. If there are people like that, am I not allowed to do it?" His intentions might not be racist, I point out, but he uses the same cliches in his portrayal of black people that openly racist people use. "Who is racist?" he asks rhetorically. "The people who are worrying about it! They're the racists! Because I don't worry about it. I'm just seeing it as giving Oprah a different voice.

I don't care that she's black. I think people go around treading on eggshells and worrying, 'Ooh, is he racist?' No! You're fucking racist because you're worrying about it. I'm not worrying about it because I know I'm not racist!" But what if he offends people even if it was not his intention to do so? "No one's ever come up to me in the street and said I was being racist." What if the people who find him offensive are choosing just to ignore him in the street? "Well, all I can say is sorry. It were funny though, weren't it? And it didn't kill anyone." What about the women who object to his ultra-sexualised portrayal of female characters and the constant negative references (particularly by his Spice Girl Mel B character) to their genitals? "Well, it's a boys' show, isn't it?" Francis counters. "I've given Avid a wife in the new series, so more women might relate to it." What does Francis's wife think of his portrayal of women? "She never mentioned it.

She knows it's just me messing about and getting paid for it and I'm not trying to do anything but make people laugh." It seems that the only point of Bo' Selecta! is that there is no point. It is wilfully meaningless. It is a show adored by a generation of men who are completely apolitical and borderline nihilistic. Francis feels an affinity with them. "The equivalent of my show in the 80s was Spitting Image, which was all about politics," he says. "But young lads now don't care about politics. As long as their lifestyles are what they want, they're not bothered about anything else. When people go on about Tony Blair or whatever, they think, 'That doesn't affect me. And whoever gets in next, well, there's nothing I can do about it and I'll just live however the world changes.' And that's how I live. As long as I'm not dying and my arms aren't falling off, then I'm not bothered." Then he launches into a spectacular impersonation of Tess Daly in a yoghurt advert, widening his eyes, protruding his lips and saying, "Ee by gum" in a deep Yorkshire accent.

However uncomfortable some viewers might feel about the content of his humour, his brilliant stupidity is irresistible to many. It has rendered him an outsider in what he calls London's "comedy mafia" (made up of BBC-centric, middle-class, well-educated former stand-ups). "Dom Joly once said I was as thick as two short planks and should get a scriptwriter," he beams. "Like, Trigger Happy is amazing, isn't it? 'Hello! It's me! I'm in the library!' It must have taken them ages to write that." Leigh Francis is just "happy to be working" and desperate for his fifth series to be a success. He has even set up a MySpace page to help spread the word. And he knows that, at the very least, he has a legion of loyal underage fans who will bump up the ratings. "We have young kids who shouldn't be watching it really," he says. "Parents will come up to me and say, 'Will you sign this for our son? He loves the show. But don't put anything rude.' And I'm like: 'Don't put anything rude?! Then don't let him watch the show!'".

· Bo' in the USA starts on Friday at 10.50pm on Channel 4 Alter Ego Acting - TV Tropes Alter Ego Acting You need to login to do this. Get Known if you don't have an account Share Cuz nobody wants to see Marshall no more They want Shady — I'm chopped liver" — Eminem , "Without Me" It can be said that some roles take on a life of their own, separate from the actor that plays them. Fox Mulder lives more vividly in our collective imagination than David Duchovny; Leonard Nimoy was so eclipsed by his character in Star Trek that he titled his autobiographies I Am Not Spock and (once he'd made his peace with it) I Am Spock respectively. However, some actors not only allow the character this existence, they actively cultivate them as a persona as real as any other person walking around. This is usually done in one of a couple of ways. The first way is to portray the individual as an entirely separate person, while acknowledging the existence of the actor. The character may refer to the actor in the third person, or vice versa. The second version is to entirely subsume the "real" actor in the role.

In this case, the actor is never mentioned by the character and the actor almost never appears in "public". The third method is when the actor acknowledges the character is "them", but somehow a "different" them. This is the least frequently seen, most subtle version, and the mechanism of this change in personality is not consistent, further making it more difficult to recognize. See also Adam Westing , where a celebrity's public persona is a self-parody, but still uses their real name. In a case of Real Life Writes the Plot , Alter Ego Acting isn't limited to the actors themselves; many of the fans, especially with sci-fi or fantasy series (like the Furry Fandom ) use this trope to various levels in regards to their internet personas. In a reversal to the trope being applied to the actors, the third method is usually the most used, to the point where the fans refuse to respond to anything but their alter ego's name. Typically, though, the alter ego has enough personality quirks that only work within the confines of fantasy, the alter ego is unable to be fully emulated in the 'real world' during standard, off-line living and, thus, their real selves are markedly different, no matter how much they try.

Examples: Type 1 Dame Edna Everage, who refers to Barry Humphries as her "entrepreneur" or manager. Andy Kaufman pretended to have a difficult working relationship with his alter ego, Tony Clifton. His dedication to making Tony a separate persona went as far as appearing on stage with him - "him" actually being a friend (usually Andy's close colleague Bob Zmuda) dressed as Clifton and imitating Andy's Clifton voice. It went further than that, actually; Andy would go far out of his way to do things in character that he would never have done as himself. When he was disguised as Tony, he chain-smoked cigarettes, never turned down a free drink, and ate red meat without blinking an eye — all guaranteed to shock anyone who knew that it was Andy Kaufman (a fairly straight-edge vegan) behind that mustache. It went even further when Andy permanently passed the Tony persona on to Bob Zmuda circa 1982.

Bob was convincing enough that many people didn't realize for years that he had taken over the role; as revealed by Jim Carrey in the 1994 Comedy Salute to Andy Kaufman special, a good half of Tony's TV appearances were done by Bob and not Andy. (Speaking of Carrey, see below...) After Andy's death, Bob reprised the character at a tribute/benefit, and Tony still occasionally resurfaces via several performers. This raised it to Charlie Brown from Outta Town level. Japanese television personality Masaki Sumitani does not respond to being called by the name of his alter ego, Razer Ramon HG (a.k.a. Hard Gay, a.k.a. HG-kun). He has, however, left fans briefly, changed into costume, and "sent" HG-kun to fulfill their interview requests. When ambushed on a TV program with his shades off, he realized there was a camera pointed at him, hid his face and scrambled for his hat and sunglasses to get into character. Dan Aykroyd as Elwood Blues .

In fact, bonus material from the House of Blues Radio Hour even features Elwood interviewing Dan about his work with Jim Belushi, as the "Dancing Refrigerators". In another example, John Landis gets interviewed, and treats Elwood and Dan as totally different people Paul Reubens tended to portray Pee-Wee Herman as a completely separate person, even billing the character as being played by "himself" in movie credits. He had never been interviewed as Paul Reubens until the film Mystery Men came out. Even then he managed to get through the first few minutes of the interview without saying a word, responding with nodding or shaking his head until forced to answer a non yes/no question. Jay Leno- "Okay, what time is it?" Paul - (presses button on talking watch) Daniel Handler shows up at " Lemony Snicket's " book signings as a representative of Mr. Snicket , or sometimes "Mr. Snicket's Handler", and tells fans that the author was detained by some unfortunate accident. This is a slight variation, since while Handler writes under the pseudonym Lemony Snicket, he never "plays" Snicket in public.

He would occasionally give an interview where he acknowledged Snicket's fictionality, making him a type 3 as well. This trope was inverted, subverted, and played with 6 ways from Sunday on the DVD commentary, featuring Handler in character as Snicket, with director Brad Silberling. Silberling tries to claim that Jim Carrey was replaced by the real Count Olaf, and Snicket plays along at first. After a while, he becomes bored, and begins accusing Silberling of lying to him. So we have the real author playing his fictional creation critiquing a real actor under fake circumstances while the real director claims that his real film features the fictional author's fictional character for real. In an unusual journalistic example, Hunter S. Thompson created a public persona that played up his flaws and general craziness to a point where he mirrored as much as reported the nastiness, paranoia, and absurdity around him. Often, this was under the name of Raoul Duke; just as often, it wasn't, falling into the third type of Alter Ego Acting .

Many pro wrestlers fall into this in Real Life , especially when Kayfabe was in high reign, but Mick Foley is probably the only one who made it actually part of his gimmick; in the later part of his WWE run, it was openly acknowledged that he had three "faces" that he would put on as the situation demanded (Dude Love, Cactus Jack, and Mankind), as well as his own normal persona that was rarely seen in the ring. TNA recently resurrected this aspect of Mick Foley's character, as Mick "interviewed" Cactus Jack; as the mock interview went on, Cactus took on a life of his own, accusing Foley of being a craven sellout cashing in on the fame that Cactus had earned by sacrificing their shared body, something Foley would never have done if it were up to him. Gregory Helms , best known for his Superhero gimmick of "the Hurricane," would at times appear on WWE TV as a reporter under his own name. Sacha Baron-Cohen attempts to portray his various characters as real people completely separate from himself. He has sometimes referred to himself as a separate person while in character.

Responding to critics of his film Borat , he assumed the character of Borat to join in on the criticism, leveling anti-Semitic slurs against himself. When promoting his films, he usually insists on appearing in-character. A strange example of this: on Australian program Rove Live, Sacha was playing Brï¿½no while promoting the film of the same name. When Rove did his usual "20 bucks in 20 seconds" questionnaire, his final question was for Bruno to tell Rove what he thought of a picture of Borat, to which Bruno replied that Borat was "an incredibly racist stereotype" and "he's played by Sacha Baron-whatever, right? Yeah, he really can't act". John Clark played Fred Dagg for many years, with the character being treated as essentially real, with other media and interviews playing along. Since everybody knew Fred Dagg, John Clark could not be himself or play any other roles, and eventually left New Zealand partly to escape the role. Stephen Colbert 's "Stephen Colbert" persona, discussed below, has another persona, Ching Chong Ding Dong, an offensive portrayal of a Chinese person.

"Stephen Colbert" argues that he cannot be held responsible for the actions "Ching Chong" does, since "Ching Chong" did it, not "Stephen." In a number of his late novels (after he'd pretty much lost his marbles), Philip K. Dick used characters named Phil Dick and Horselover Fat (the rough meanings of his two names) to try to parse out his spiritual beliefs and experiences. Near the height of Garth Brooks ' career in country music, he released an alternative rock album under the pseudonym In The Life Of Chris Gaines . He clearly played it as though he was creating a character, going so far as to release a VH-1 mockumentary, and hosting SNL as Garth Brooks but being the musical guest as Chris Gaines. Related: sometimes avatars in the online virtual reality Second Life refer to their "typists" (or similar terms), making a distinction between the character and the human playing him/her/it: e.g. "Sorry I have to go, but my typist is making me go to bed." The consistency with which this convention is applied varies greatly, with some always maintaining character and others using it as an occasional joke.

The same is true of online role-playing in general, where those who use MUCKs, MMORPGs, and other real-time roleplay programs (or just roleplay through online messengers) will speak in-character of their "player" needing to leave/eat/go to the bathroom/sleep. This can be Played for Laughs through a bit of Black Comedy , as when the character really would like to continue but can't, so threatens the "player" for making them have to leave. Sharp-tongued Lily Savage was always entirely separate from her actor Paul O'Grady, and he usually speaks of her as if she's a completely different person. For example, when he gets people asking him to perform as Lily again, his usual reply is "She's gone off to join the convent." Anthony Fantano of the music review The Needle Drop has a slightly offbeat silly "roommate" Cal Chuchesta, that pops up time to time and sometimes gets his own reviews . The members of GWAR would sometimes open shows as the band "X-Cops." In the mid-90s it was spun off as a new band made up of non-GWAR members.

This was also done by Spinal Tap who perform in character (they are actually actors). Christopher Guest as well as many of the other writers and actors from Spinal Tap made a similar mockumentary called A Mighty Wind . They did one show in which the band from Mighty Wind opened for Spinal Tap. They were booed off the stage by fans who were either unaware or uncaring that they were the same people. For some time, Devo did the same thing, opening for themselves as Dove: the Band of Love. At first they were hippies, but during the 80's they became right-wing Christians, and even captured and brain-washed Devo's mascot Booji Boy during a show. Devo's music was held as Satanic and horrible, despite the fact that Dove played an awful lot of covers. And then there's Booji Boy himself, who is Mark Mothersbaugh in a baby mask singing with a disturbing falsetto. John Lydon invented the Johnny Rotten persona to handle public appearances, as he (Rotten) says he's (Lydon) extremely shy in real life. Depending on whether he's promoting The Sex Pistols and gonzo work or Public Image Ltd.

, he appears as either Rotten or Lydon. In Pappy's Flatshare Slamdown , Tom always plays the Beef Brothers round as Fanshawe Standon. Matthew: Thomas, to conclude the case for the defence, are you going to be doing it as yourself? Tom: No, I'm going to be be defending in the style of a John Grisham, deep southern American lawyer, Mr Fanshawe Standon. A lot of anniversary specials for cartoon characters (particularly the Warner Bros. characters) will portray them as actual people, even when interviews are done with the directors, animators, and voice actors, none of whom bother to continue with the charade (which make the proceedings all the more confusing). They even go as far as to have celebrities give anecdotes about occasions where Bugs , Daffy , and the rest worked with them or met their families. Type 2 Daft Punk never appear in public without helmets on and have not been photographed as themselves in ages. There are currently only one or two pictures of them without their helmets or another face obstructing item. The major cast of Trailer Park Boys appear in character almost constantly, even including "behind the scenes" commentary on the DVD for the show.

Carroll Spinney, who portrays Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch, supposedly refused to do Sesame Street -related interviews out of character. Company policy at Jim Henson Co. was that the actors and puppeteers who play the various Muppet characters are not allowed to engage anyone in an on camera interview. However both Henson and Spinney made separate appearances on the syndicated version of What's My Line? ? However, Kevin Clash has been a guest on two different Food Network shows, complete with Elmo voice, and he's also made other appearances . Played with during the Muppet appearance on The West Wing . Nobody broke character or showed the puppeteers behind the puppets. This one varies. Sometimes, the appearance on the talk show/cooking show/other show has the characters appear and does its best to hide the puppeteer(s).

Other times (more rarely, but mostly with Henson himself, Frank Oz, and the majority of guest Muppet performers at the Muppetfest convention in 2001), the puppeteer and puppet will co-exist, with the puppeteers talking about their character while still slipping back into character to talk with the host/moderator(s), any other characters making an appearance, or the puppeteer him/herself . ( It's a little trippy, which is probably just how Henson liked it. ). Lastly (and most rarely), it's just the puppeteer, which mostly happens on Muppet fansites (though even then it can slip into the second type). The members of Finnish heavy metal band Lordi make all of their public appearances in the elaborate monster costumes they wear onstage, and have gone to unusual lengths to keep their real names secret from the public. (Indeed, the band's first demo video has never been released to the public because it shows the singer, "Mr.

Lordi", with no mask.) When a gossip magazine showed a picture of Lordi without his mask (on the cover, no less), it created a massive backlash and tens of thousands of fans signing a petition of boycotting the magazine, eventually resulting in a public apology from it. Part of this is because all the members of the band are very private people, actually working in a normal job as well as being a monster rocker, or both. Amen, for instance, is a web designer, and at least one of the members is a music teacher. When Jim Carrey was cast as Andy Kaufman in Man on the Moon he stayed in character(s) for the duration of the shoot (see above and below); this included not responding to his own name. (In addition, after the shoot was completed, Tony Clifton was discussed in Type One terms by all the participants.) A really bizarre case was when "Kaufman" went auditioning for How the Grinch Stole Christmas! . The Dr. Seuss estate rejected him, but then Carrey broke out of that character and did a Grinch impersonation that got him the role.

Mana from Moi Dix Mois (formerly Malice Mizer) is almost never seen out of costume, out of character (e.g. speaking), or out in public. When he has been, it's usually by accident/some sort of freakish fluke. And when he is photographed out of costume, nine times out of ten his face is mostly obscured by a large hat and sunglasses, and he's wearing bulky black clothing. He even appears like this when he's caught out suddenly by stray fans or photographers, which seems to suggest that this 'incognito' look is genuinely what he wears on a day to day basis. Jane Turner and Gina Riley rarely appear out of character as Kath and Kim . Larry the Cable Guy used to simply be a role Daniel Lawrence Whitney would use on stage in his comedy routine, but it eventually took over his entire persona in all work he did - film, television, interviews, et cetera. He even wrote a book in-character, littered with grammatical errors. Whitney will usually break character for a few seconds once or twice per show as part of a joke.

Rob Potylo used to record albums, play concerts, and make appearances on radio shows or at comedy clubs as Robby Roadsteamer, a trashy Jerkass Guttural Growler initially inspired by the way he saw singers for local nu-metal bands carry themselves on stage. He did some interviews as himself where he'd acknowledge Robby Roadsteamer as a character, but for the most part he would never appear publicly as himself. The character eventually got retired because he was concerned that if he kept it up too long he'd be pigeonholed - nowadays he makes music as himself rather than the character. It's since been joked that Robby Roadsteamer still exists, he just hasn't been heard from in years because he and his band left the Boston music scene for Western Massachusetts. Comedian Leigh Francis has hardly ever appeared on TV as himself. He is currently known as Keith Lemon, but has previously been Avid Merrion, The Bear, and singer Craig David note One of his many celebrity impressions from Bo' Selecta!, which is nothing like the real person: Craig is not an incontinent Northerner with a pet falcon.

Daniel Day-Lewis has a major case of this, as he heavily researches his film roles to get into character - months before shooting even begins. When he's involved in the production process of films like Last of the Mohicans , Gangs of New York , There Will Be Blood and many others, he won't refer to himself as anything other than the name of his character on or off-set. One story mentions that this has caused at least one friendship to break down - Liam Neeson won't even talk to Day-Lewis anymore because, when they were exercising together during an off day while filming Gangs, Day-Lewis wouldn't respond to Neeson calling him his real name - he would only speak if he was referred to as "Bill The Butcher". In an unusual subversion, comedian Andrew Clay Silverstein has been practically forced into a sort of Type 2 version of this trope. His character, Andrew "Dice" Clay , is seen as such an over the top misogyist and homophobe that fans and detractors alike are unable or unwilling to separate the actor from his character, despite the profound difference between his real and assumed personalities, and his more recent attempts to distance himself from "The Diceman".

This hasn't been helped by many other performers refusing to perform or appear with Silverstein, even out-of-character. The mistake he made was refusing to ever break character for so long that most people assumed the Diceman was a real guy. Type 3 Veteran rocker Alice Cooper often refers to the stage version of himself either directly or indirectly as someone he "becomes" when he walks out to perform. He's not shy about being seen out of character, however. He's performed many interviews and public appearances as his normal, mild-mannered self, and even lampshades the distinction in Wayne's World , where he gives his backstage entourage a short lecture on Milwaukee history. He also does a nightly, syndicated radio show, 'Nights with Alice Cooper' where he is very well spoken, funny and knowledgable. He tells jokes and stories about other musicians and interviews his famous friends. He regularly makes the distinction between his real life self and his stage persona on air. In interviews, Vincent Furnier (Alice Cooper's real name) refers to Alice Cooper in the third person, and has mentioned that his children didn't think of Alice Cooper as their father when they were growing up.

Penn & Teller also maintain a distinct "version" of themselves for the stage. Most notably, Teller is almost never seen to speak on stage, maintaining a mute contrast to Penn Jillette's boisterous, extra-large personality. This model of themselves has been consistent even in other roles, for example in an episode of Babylon 5 where they played comedy team Reebo and Zooty. Off stage, however, Teller is known to be an articulate and engaging speaker. On occasion, when Teller speaks on camera, his face is obscured. A notable subversion is their feature-length film Penn & Teller Get Killed , in which Teller maintains his mute persona until the very end, when he breaks character and speaks. The Fan: Everyone knows Teller doesn't speak! Andy Kaufman , again, experimented extensively with different personas on stage — all of them called "Andy Kaufman," but not representative of his real personality. Stephen Colbert 's on-air persona as a self-centered, hypocritical, frothing-at-the-mouth strawman conservative commentator is a complete act.

Questioned by Larry King, he confirmed that "I call him 'him'." This became surreal when he was vetted for a position in Barack Obama's cabinet, and Fake!Colbert insisted that he, the real person, could not be held responsible for the actions of a character he portrayed. One episode parodied this. It featured the fake Stephen Colbert thinking he was going to interview the animated members of the cartoon band Gorillaz , but was disappointed to find out he was only interviewing their creators Damon Albarn and Jamie Hewlett (after Murdoc Niccals called Stephen up and explained he couldn't make it). Stephen stormed off the set, forcing the real Stephen to fill in. It got really interesting at the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner, where the Fake!Colbert " praised " George W. Bush 's administration. ("'Oh, they're just rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.' First of all, that is a terrible metaphor. This administration is not sinking. This administration is soaring.

If anything, they are rearranging the deck chairs on the Hindenburg!") While many have mocked the Bush administration for not getting the joke, it's worth noting that the opening speech was delivered by President Bush while an impersonator played his thoughts, so it's likely Bush got the joke and his staff didn't. In-Universe , Maven of the Eventide is pretty much Elisa Hansen's character indulging her pretentious vampire fangirl side. Welshy even asked her "What facet of your character am I actually addressing right now?" "Bill and Ben" from the New Zealand TV show Pulp Sport half embody this trope - while some of their skits are pre-scripted and they act alongside other people who are also generally playing themselves, other skits (usually the ones involving physical pain ) aren't scripted and the guys are reacting in genuine ways. Interestingly, Ben could be seen as just playing himself, while Bill could be seen as playing a character - his real first name is Jamie. Weird case: Brazilian soccer legend Pelé refers to himself as two different persons, Edison (his birth name; the everyday person) and Pelé (the footballer).

Comedian Lewis Black, in reality a very gracious and soft-spoken man whose stage persona is a loud, profane near-lunatic. He said in one interview "If I was that person all the time, I would die." As in the page quote, Eminem generally raps as his alter ego Slim Shady, although he frequently blurs the line between the two personalities. In effect, there are three people in his music: Marshall Mathers, the quiet, slightly disturbed kid; Eminem, the self-assured, cocky rapper; and Slim Shady, the brutal, murderous gangster. Which one's in charge usually depends on his voice (the angrier he sounds, the further down the list he goes). His first album titles even reference his multiplicity: The Slim Shady EP/LP, The Marshall Mathers LP and The Eminem Show. The personalities on Cracked.com are starting to fall into a very labyrinthine version of this. Dan O'Brien is on record that his and Michael Swaim's characters in Agents of Cracked (or their similar but more toned-down counterparts on After Hours) are nothing like them.

He also says that his column-writing persona and Swaim's Cracked TV/Does Not Compute character are also nothing like them either. In Hannah Montana , teen pop sensation Miley Cyrus plays Miley Stewart and her - Stewart's, not Cyrus' - Secret Identity , teen pop sensation Hannah Montana. This is further complicated by Cyrus performing in Real Life concerts as both herself and as Hannah Montana. Sometimes in the same concert. In truth, Miley (Cyrus, that is) only performed as both Hannah and herself between 2006 and early 2008. She does take on a wilder, more extroverted "wild" persona live, though, especially when wearing outrageous costumes and wardrobes. Nicki Minaj : Onika Maraj is her real self, Nicki Minaj is her larger-than-life "Harujuku Barbie" identity, and Roman Zolanski is the angry, twisted version of herself. Flight of the Conchords : Bret and Jemaine on the show are just exaggerated versions of the real Bret and Jemaine. This is how David Bowie approached such Concept Album / concert personas as Ziggy Stardust in The '70s .

He struggled with Secret Identity Identity as a result — the BBC 's documentary profile Cracked Actor (1975) has him discussing his choice to drop the Ziggy persona because he was afraid it would overtake him. Unfortunately, he was far from his right mind (addicted to cocaine, etc.) when he created the cruel Thin White Duke for 1976's Station to Station and it proved to be his final such persona; one fansite that focuses on this period has an FAQ that discusses how the persona and the performer got disastrously entangled. Beyoncï¿½ claims that she's actually really shy in real life, and when she's on stage, it's almost like she's taken over by another person entirely, who she eventually named Sasha Fierce.

Members of the Furry Fandom vary wildly on how they apply this trope to themselves and their characters, with some considering themselves and their characters to be entirely separate and never referring to themselves as their character in real life (unless wearing a fursuit or other costume); some viewing their characters as real people whom they "channel", speaking of them in third person and slipping in and out-of-character in public; some refusing to answer to any name but their furry name (further complicated by people who get their names legally changed, not all of whom believe their furry self to be real or separate from themselves); and some not even having a "fursona", just an online handle. But in general most furries are of the Type 3 variety, acknowledging or even proudly admitting that their fursona is just like real life, only with animal features (or a different body type), with very different fursonas either being a challenging exercise in roleplaying or indulging in wish fulfillment about their ideal self. Elton John , at least by the time he started wearing silly glasses and costumes, had a very extroverted onstage persona, the antithesis of his shy, awkward private personality.

Elton also claimed his "Elton John" image was/is the opposite of everything his strict biological father wanted him to be: conservatively-clothed, with a sedate job like a banker or lawyer. Unfortunately, at the heart of his substance abuse problems (cocaine in particular) was a desire to open up more and be more sociable. For the most part, the main character of TV Trash , Chris "Rowdy Reviewer" Moore, seems to be just a snarkier version of the real life Chris Moore. Freddie Mercury was a shy, private, introverted person away from the public eye, and it took a few days to transform into the more extroverted, flamboyant, cocky persona he was known for being, at least onstage. He also seemed to use the persona to get through interviews (when he did them at all) in the music press, especially as rock journalists were often abusive to Freddie and Queen, especially in the early years. An odd example lies on the show Parks and Recreation where the character Andy becomes "Bert Macklin, FBI agent" when approached with a situation that might involve some form of detective work.

Played for Laughs with Pawnee radio hosts 'The Douche', who will make lewd jokes in public and follow them with "that was The Douche talking". Tom Baker kept up the persona of the fourth Doctor during his time on Doctor Who , and if fans met him in the street, he always tried to make sure they met the Doctor. Even when speaking in first person about acting and doing the job, he would often refer to 'Tom Baker' in the third person to refer to the person who he used to be. The interview with him on Swap Shop (included as a special feature on the DVD of "The Hand of Fear") shows Noel Edmunds, the interviewer, becoming clearly disquieted by this, and several times asking Tom to drop the persona. There are also several points in the interview where confusion arises over whether people are asking the actor or the Doctor questions, causing Tom to give ambiguous answers in the Doctor persona with blatant Reality Subtext ("I can't remember my age... sometimes I feel like I'm over 700 years old and sometimes I feel like I'm 42").

Done in the long term that it was, and not helped by the fact that the Doctor's personality in that incarnation was based on his own, it caused the line between the Doctor and the real Tom to become very blurry to the point where even forty years later he occasionally speaks of his difficulty separating them. It also had deleterious effects on his mental health, causing Inferiority Superiority Complex , occasional delusions and drastic shifts in his on-screen personality . Caused a major media shitstorm in the UK in 2014 when Vine artist Dapper Laughs got his own ITV2 show, On The Pull with Dapper Laughs, a dating show in which he gave various men advice in getting girls. When Twitter had a collective meltdown about the sexist content, Dapper Laughs' use of Rape as Comedy and the fact that a lot of his fans were the sort of people who send abuse to women online , ITV pulled the show and Laughs was invited on the news to apologise. He appeared as 'himself' and explained that Dapper Laughs was just a character, that he didn't realise people took so seriously - prompting a certain amount of debate as to whether using an ironic 'character' made awful content acceptable.

Charlie Brooker suggested that much of the problem was that, even though Laughs was a character, he was giving advice about dating to real people as that character, meaning it seemed sincere. In Some Jerk with a Camera , the Jerk is at least somewhat fictional, but he has been referred to as "Tony Goldmark", and takes credit for pre-Jerk works of Tony's. The presenters of Top Gear and The Grand Tour are basically Flanderized versions of their real life personas. The real Jeremy Clarkson is not as boorish, smug, and insensitive as he appears, Richard Hammond is far from stupid and not nearly as risk-taking, and James May is quite modern in outlook and not nearly as fussy as the shows make him out to be. Top Gear tended to blur the line more, especially as in the early days when the presenters had yet to fully develop their style; perhaps as a result, many have noticed The Grand Tour playing up to the cartoonish personas more.

:: Indexes :: Celebjuicefan: Juicy Catch Phrases Juicy Catch Phrases Don't Be A Ding Bat Shit-ting Easy as peas or Simple as peas Pick a catorgor-rorory Lesbican You know you want to Pump up the jam pump it up ....get your booty on the floor tonight Make me day Sax sounds like Sex, Piano sounds a bit like Penis. You use your penis to make love, and my favourite numbers a million! Leigh Francis (born 30 May 1974) is an English comedy performer. He is most famous for his comedy series Bo' Selecta! and portrayal of Romanian character Avid Merrion, as well as northern businessman Keith Lemon in Keith Lemon's Very Brilliant World Tour, Celebrity Juice as well as many appearances on Big Brother UK's companion shows Big Brother's Little Brother and Big Brother's Big Mouth. Early life and career Francis was born in Leeds. He attended Harrington High School (latterly Farnley Park High, then later renamed to Farnley Park Maths and Computing College) in Leeds, near his home in Old Farnley. He was brought up on a council estate in Leeds.

His father died aged 47 of cancer; his mother and sister live in Spain. Before making his television breakthrough, he studied at the Leeds College of Art and became a graphic designer. He was discovered by television presenter Davina McCall. One of his first roles on TV was in the guise of a character Lolly Stark, who gave tips with the ladies on Dom and Kirk's Nite O Plenty, aired on Paramount TV from January to July 1996. Bobby claimed to seduce female celebrities using Scotch and Bru, the combination of Irn-Bru and Scotch eggs. Leigh also appeared in character guise as Barry Gibson in the early series of Channel 4's Popworld. Holly Marie Willoughby (born 10 February 1981) is an English television presenter and model, known for her work in presenting children's TV and entertainment shows. In her early career she modelled underwear and went on to present CD:UK. In 2006, she won a BAFTA and was chosen to present Dancing on Ice, a highly popular UK celebrity talent show, shown on ITV1 which drew in an average of 8.9m million viewers in the 2010 series.

In July 2009 she was selected as a replacement for Fern Britton on This Morning. She began presenting on This Morning on 14 September 2009, alongside Phillip Schofield. Early life The younger of two daughters of the manager of a double-glazing company and an air stewardess, Willoughby was educated at the independent Burgess Hill School For Girls in the town of Burgess Hill in West Sussex. She went on to attend The College of Richard Collyer in Horsham. Modelling career In 1995, at the age of 14, Willoughby was spotted by talent scouts at The Clothes Show Live exhibition. Storm Model Management signed her up. She appeared in teen magazines for girls such as Mizz, Just Seventeen and More!. From 1998, at the age of 17, she started modelling underwear for various clients including Pretty Polly. She appeared in various adverts and posters.

Rufus Hound (born Robert James Blair Simpson on 6 March 1979) is a British comedian and media personality.Career Hound hosted Destination Three, the coverage of The Glastonbury Festival and Top of the Pops in 2005 and 2006 alongside Fearne Cotton. He presented the idiosyncratic reality show Grime Scene Investigation on BBC Three with staff and students from Aston University, and narrated BBC Two's broadcasts of Mythbusters. He has also appeared in many comedy shows and quizzes such as Street Cred Sudoku and Celebrity Juice, where he is a regular panellist. He narrated the 2009 series Rocket Science and has appeared on The Apprentice: You're Fired! and Richard & Judy. He also presents Outtake TV on BBC1, replacing Anne Robinson.In early 2008, Hound appeared twice on ITV's Thank God You're Here in the United Kingdom, after initially working as the warm-up act. Fearne Cotton (born 3 September 1981) is an English television and radio presenter known for presenting a number of popular TV programmes such as Top of the Pops and the Red Nose Day telethon.

In 2007, she became the first regular female presenter of BBC Radio 1's Chart Show. She now presents BBC Radio 1's weekday mid-morning programme, taking over from long-time host Jo Whiley. Biography Cotton was born in Northwood, London to Lyn and Mick Cotton; she has a younger brother called Jamie. Her father was a sign writer for events such as Live Aid and her mother worked in alternative therapy. She grew up in the West London suburb of Eastcote and was educated at Haydon School in West London. She is a pescatarian and an animal lover. She runs 5 km at least three times a week, and has participated in several half marathons for charity. Former BBC executive Sir Bill Cotton (1928–2008) was her paternal grandfather's cousin. He was the son of the well-known entertainer and band leader Billy Cotton.

She began her presenting career in 1998, at the age of 17, with early morning GMTV children's programme The Disney Club, after she was discovered in a nationwide talent search during the show Keith Lesbican You know you want to Pump up the jam pump it up ....get your booty on the floor tonight Make me day Sax sounds like Sex, Piano sounds a bit like Penis. You use your penis to make love, and my favourite numbers a million! Celebrity Juice wesite Link you can apply for tickets to see Celebrity Juice being recorded via this website OFFICIAL WESITE The official website of the show. Features clips from the show and some exclusive behind the scenes videos. WIKIPEDIA ENTRY A write-up about the panel show from the encyclopedia website. INTERNET MOVIE DATABABE (IMDB) RECORD The Internet Movie Database profile for 'Celebrity Juice' - provides cast and crew details. MY YOUTUBE CHANNEL This link will take you straight to my youtube page where you can watch Celebrity Juice, and Keith Lemon Clips! Trying to get them all on there so you can watch them all from one place!

ENJOY Celebjuicefan: Keith Lemon hosts new show on ITV Keith Lemon hosts new show on ITV Vernon Kay has been ditched from forthcoming Saturday night show, Sing If You Can, and been replaced by Celebrity Juice star Keith Lemon. Keith, real name Leigh Francis, will now join I’m a Celebrity winner Stacey Solomon to host the fun filled, celebrity packed gameshow. Let the madness commence… According to Broadcast, ITV claimed the format of the show was more "madcap" than anticipated, and therefore more suited to Lemon. An insider said: "The tone took us by surprise a little - there was much more mayhem than we expected and we felt that a comedian would be best suited to host the show.” Vernon (who may have had a lucky escape) said: "Following the pilot, the producers and I sat down and talked about the tone of the show. We all agreed that because of the mix of comedy and slapstick challenges that it would benefit from having a comedian host it. I'm really happy with the decision." Celebrities who are confirmed for the show include Jedward, Ray Quinn and Sinitta. It certainly sounds interesting... Posted by

Question: Leigh Francis is the real name of which TV entertainer, the character first appeared in ?Whatever I Want? then ?Bo Selecta??
Answer: Keith Lemon