Ben Elton

In September 2019, Elton embarked on a three-month long UK stand-up tour, his first since 2004.

Elton wrote All is True, released 2018, a speculative story of William Shakespeare's years in Stratford-upon-Avon after his retirement from the theatre and move from London. Along with the filmcraft and acting, returning collaboration with Kenneth Branagh, All is True shows Elton giving a more serious and biographical perspective to some of the same characters who appear in Upstart Crow.

In 2016 Elton wrote the sitcom Upstart Crow, parodying the writing and family life of William Shakespeare, and starring David Mitchell as Shakespeare. This programme ran for a second series in 2017, and a third series in 2018.

In September 2016, filming began in Western Australia on Three Summers, a romantic comedy film written and directed by Elton, which was released in 2017.

In 2015, Elton wrote a Wiggles song for the Wiggle Town DVD and CD: The Wonder of Wiggle Town.

He was a Labour Party supporter and was one of the biggest private financial donors to the party. However, Elton distanced himself from the Party under Tony Blair and New Labour, instead donating and voting for the Green Party, although in April 2015, he stated that he was "back with Labour" for the 2015 general election.

Elton became a stand-up comedian primarily to showcase his own writing, but became one of Britain's biggest live comedy acts. After a regular slot on Saturday Live – later moved and renamed Friday Night Live – which was seen as a UK version of the US's Saturday Night Live, he became the host of the programme.

We'd had a very happy time all together, so there were no old scores to be settled really, we'd been a pretty happy bunch. And yet one person, who'd been a bit of a golden boy – he certainly went out with a girl I was besotted and unrequitedly in love with – he came up and he said, 'Why did you come? Was it to show off?' That really surprised me, that anyone would think that ... he came kind of carrying my agenda. It was weird. I hasten to add I didn't think my life to be more successful than anybody else's. If you're happy and honest and fulfilled in what you do, then you're having a successful life.

In 2012 a new sitcom for BBC1 was commissioned written and produced by Elton starring David Haig. Filming for a full six-part series of the sitcom The Wright Way (formerly known as Slings and Arrows) was completed in late February 2013. It debuted in April 2013 to negative reviews.

Elton worked on Ben Elton Live From Planet Earth, a live one-hour comedy show which debuted on 8 February 2011 on the Nine Network in Australia. Live from Planet Earth was axed by the Nine Network on Wednesday 23 February 2011 after three episodes, despite having six commissioned. The show's final airing rated 200,000 viewers.

On 10 October 2010, Elton headlined the first episode of Dave's One Night Stand.

In April 2007, Get a Grip, a new show, began on ITV1. Featuring comic sketches similar to those on The Ben Elton Show and staged studio discussion between Elton and 23-year-old Alexa Chung, the show's aim was to "contrast Elton's middle-aged viewpoint with Chung's younger perspective" (although Elton was responsible for the scripts).

Elton wrote the six-part sitcom Blessed, starring Ardal O'Hanlon as a record producer, on BBC1 in 2005. No further series was commissioned.

In 2005 Elton toured for the first time since 1997, touring the UK with Get a Grip. He toured Australia and New Zealand with the same show in 2006.

On a publicity tour for Past Mortem in 2004, Elton mused on the high school reunion theme and his own drama college reunion:

Tonight's the Night, based on the songs of Rod Stewart, opened in November 2003.

Elton has been criticised for writing a musical with Conservative Party supporter Andrew Lloyd Webber. In his defence, Elton said "If I were to refuse to talk to Tories, I would narrow my social and professional scope considerably. If you judge all your relationships on a person's voting intentions, I think you miss out on the varieties of life." He is also one of the few items to have been put into Room 101 twice: first by Anne Robinson in 2001 and then by Mark Steel.

Elton wrote and directed the film adaptation of his novel Inconceivable, under the title Maybe Baby (2000) starring Hugh Laurie and Joely Richardson. It was a moderate UK success and distributed globally. The film was also nominated for a prize at Germany's Emden Film Festival.

Elton collaborated with Andrew Lloyd Webber on The Beautiful Game in 2000, writing the book and lyrics (Lloyd Webber wrote the music). The Beautiful Game won the London Critics Circle Award for best new musical. Elton went on to write compilation shows featuring popular songs from the catalogues of pop/rock artists. The first was the musical We Will Rock You with music by Queen. Despite unfavourable early reaction, this was successful in the West End and won the 2003 Theatregoers' Choice Award for Best New Musical. It has since opened in the US, Australia, Russia, Spain, South Africa, Japan, Germany, Switzerland, Sweden, Canada, and The Netherlands. Elton also directed the 10th Anniversary Arena tour, in 2013. The musical ran for 12 years in London.

The Ben Elton Show (1998) followed a format similar to The Man from Auntie and featured Ronnie Corbett, a comedian of the old guard that the "alternative comedians" of the 1980s were the direct alternative to, as a regular guest. It was Elton's last high-profile network programme in the UK as a stand-up comedian.

Elton wrote and produced The Thin Blue Line, a studio-based sitcom set in a police station, also starring Rowan Atkinson, which ran for two series in 1995 and 1996. A prime-time family show, its traditional format and characters won it the 1995 British Comedy Award and both the public and professional Jury Awards at Reims.

He parodied himself in the sketch "Benny Elton" for Harry Enfield and Chums in 1994, using the style of Benny Hill to send up his (Elton's) "right on" socialist image as a politically correct spoilsport, chasing Page Three models around a park to chastise them and tricking heterosexual couples into becoming gay.

While in bit parts in his own TV series, he began professional film acting as CD in Stark, the Australian/BBC TV series adaptation of his novel, in 1993. This was directed by Nadia Tass and filmed in Australia.

Elton played Verges in Kenneth Branagh's film adaptation of William Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing, also in 1993.

In 1990 he starred in his own stand-up comedy and sketch series, Ben Elton: The Man from Auntie, which had a second series in 1994. (The title plays on The Man from UNCLE: "Auntie" is a nickname for the BBC.) In 1989 Elton won the Royal Television Society Writers' Award.

He has published 16 novels since 1989, published by Simon and Schuster (the first four) and the rest by Transworld.

He made two albums of comedy, Motormouth (1987) and Motorvation (1988).

Elton met Australian bass player Sophie Gare in 1987: they married in 1994 and have three children. He lives in Fremantle, Western Australia and in East Sussex, England. Elton holds dual British/Australian citizenship, the latter since 2004. He said he would like to move back to London when his children have finished school.

Elton champions left-wing political positions. Prior to the 1987 UK general election, Elton supported Red Wedge by participating in a comedy tour organised by the campaign.

Elton and Curtis also wrote Atkinson's 1986 stage show The New Revue, and Mr. Bean's "exam" episode.

Elton worked with Andrew Lloyd Webber on the sequel to Webber's 1986 The Phantom of the Opera, titled Love Never Dies.

In 1985 Elton began his writing partnership with Richard Curtis. Together they wrote Blackadder II, Blackadder the Third (in one episode, Elton appeared as a bomb-wielding anarchist), Blackadder Goes Forth and a failed sitcom pilot for Madness. Blackadder, starring Rowan Atkinson, was a worldwide hit, winning four BAFTAs and an Emmy.

In 1983/84 he wrote and appeared in Granada Television's sketch show Alfresco, which was also notable for early appearances by Stephen Fry, Hugh Laurie, Emma Thompson and Robbie Coltrane. In 1985, Elton produced his first solo script for the BBC with his comedy-drama series Happy Families, starring Jennifer Saunders and Adrian Edmondson. Elton appeared in the fifth episode as a liberal prison governor. Shortly afterwards, he reunited Rik Mayall and Edmondson with their Young Ones co-star Nigel Planer for the showbiz send-up sitcom Filthy, Rich and Catflap.

In 1981 Elton was hired by The Comedy Store as compère.

Elton grew up in Catford, south London, before moving with his family to Guildford, Surrey in 1968. Raised in a non-religious home he is an atheist. Elton studied at Stillness Junior School and Godalming Grammar School in Surrey and South Warwickshire College in Stratford-upon-Avon where he took and passed A-levels in English, History and Theatre Studies. In 1980, he graduated in Drama from the University of Manchester with upper second-class honours.

Benjamin Charles Elton (born 3 May 1959) is a British comedian, author, playwright, musical librettist, actor and director. He was a part of London's alternative comedy movement of the 1980s and became a writer on series such as The Young Ones and Blackadder, as well as continuing as a stand-up comedian on stage and television. His style in the 1980s was left-wing political satire. Since then he has published 15 novels and written the musicals The Beautiful Game (2000), We Will Rock You (2002), Tonight's the Night (2003) and Love Never Dies (2010), the sequel to The Phantom of the Opera. His novels cover the dystopian, comedy, and crime genres.