Rowan Aktinson, in full Rowan Sebastian Atkinson is an incredible british actor, screenwriter and comedian. He is best known for the sitcoms Mr. Bean and Blackladder. He has also been listed by The Observer as one of the funniest actors and british comedy and amongst the top 50 comedians ever.
Atkinson was brought up Anglican, and was educated at Durham Choristers School, St. Bees School, and Newcastle University. In 1975, he continued for the degree of MSc in Electrical Engineering at The Queen's College, Oxford, the same college his father matriculated at in 1935, which made Atkinson an Honorary Fellow in 2006. First achieving notice at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 1976, while at Oxford, he also acted and performed early sketches for the Oxford University Dramatic Society , the Oxford Revue and the Experimental Theatre Club, meeting writer Richard Curtis and composer Howard Goodall, with whom he would continue to collaborate during his career.
Atkinson had starred in a series of comedy shows for BBC Radio 3 in 1978 called The Atkinson People. It consisted of a series of satirical interviews with fictional great men, who were played by Atkinson himself. The series was written by Atkinson and Richard Curtis, and produced by Griff Rhys Jones.
After university, Atkinson toured with Angus Deayton as his straight man in an act that was eventually filmed for a television show. After the success of the show, he did a one-off pilot for London Weekend Television in 1979 called Canned Laughter. Atkinson then went on to do Not the Nine O'Clock News for the BBC, produced by his friend John Lloyd. He starred on the show along with Pamela Stephenson, Griff Rhys Jones and Mel Smith, and was one of the main sketch writers.
The success of Not the Nine O'Clock News led to his starring in the medieval sitcom The Black Adder, which he also co-wrote with Richard Curtis, in 1983. After a three-year gap, in part due to budgetary concerns, a second series was written, this time by Curtis and Ben Elton, and first screened in 1986. Blackadder II followed the fortunes of one of the descendants of Atkinson's original character, this time in the Elizabethan era. The same pattern was repeated in the two sequels Blackadder the Third (1987) (set in the Regency era), and Blackadder Goes Forth (1989) (set in World War I). The Blackadder series went on to become one of the most successful BBC situation comedies of all time, spawning television specials including Blackadder's Christmas Carol and Blackadder: The Cavalier Years (1988).
Atkinson's other famous creation, the hapless Mr. Bean, first appeared on New Years Day in 1990 in a half-hour special for Thames Television. The character of Mr. Bean has been likened somewhat to a modern-day Buster Keaton. During this time, Atkinson appeared at the Just for Laughs comedy festival in Montreal in 1987 and 1989. Several sequels to Mr. Bean appeared on television in the 1990s, and it eventually made into a major motion picture in 1997. Entitled Bean, it was directed by Mel Smith, his former co-star from Not the Nine O'Clock News. A second movie was released in 2007 entitled Mr. Bean's Holiday. In 1995 and 1997, Atkinson portrayed Inspector Raymond Fowler in the popular The Thin Blue Line television series, written by Ben Elton, which takes place in a police station located in fictitious Gasforth.
Atkinson has fronted campaigns for Kronenbourg, Hitachi electrical goods,Fujifilm, and Give Blood. Atkinson appeared as a hapless and error-prone espionage agent in a long-running series for Barclaycard, on which character his title role in Johnny English and Johnny English Reborn was based.
He also starred in a comedy spoof of Doctor Who as the Doctor, for a red nose day benefit.
Atkinson's film career began in 1983 with a supporting part in the unofficial James Bond movie Never Say Never Again and a leading role in Dead on Time with Nigel Hawthorne. He appeared in former Not the Nine O'Clock News co-star Mel Smith's directorial debut The Tall Guy in 1989. He also appeared alongside Anjelica Huston and Mai Zetterling in Roald Dahl's The Witches in 1990. In 1993 he played the part of Dexter Hayman in Hot Shots! Part Deux, a parody of Rambo III, starring Charlie Sheen. Atkinson gained further recognition with his turn as a verbally bumbling vicar in the 1994 hit Four Weddings and a Funeral. That same year he was featured in Disney's The Lion King as the voice of Zazu the Red-billed Hornbill. Atkinson continued to appear in supporting roles in successful comedies, including Rat Race (2001), Scooby-Doo (2002), and Love Actually (2003).
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In 2005, he acted in the crime/comedy Keeping Mum, which also starred Kristin Scott Thomas, Maggie Smith and Patrick Swayze.
In addition to his supporting roles, Atkinson has also had success as a leading man. His television character Mr. Bean debuted on the big screen in 1997 with Bean to international success. A sequel, Mr. Bean's Holiday, was released in March 2007 and this, as recently mentioned by Atkinson in 2011, was the last time he played the character. He has also starred in the James Bond parody Johnny English in 2003. Its sequel, Johnny English Reborn was released on 7 October 2011.
Rowan Atkinson is obsessed with cars. He owns many cars including; Renault 5 GT Turbo, Honda Civic Hybrid, McLaren F1 and Austin Metro to name a few.
The name of his most famous role; Mr. Bean, was supposed to be Mr. White originally. It was changed to Mr. Cauliflower before finally being termed as Mr. Bean.
He is a huge James Bond fan, and even got to play a supporting role in the movie ‘Never say Never Again’ in the year 1983.
Rowan Atkinson was born in a middle-class family. Because of his stuteering, he suffered a lot right from his childhood. He also got bullied by a lot of his schoolmates. As a result, he developed as a reserved person without much friends. While doing his masters degree in Oxford, he developed this huge craze for acting. Again due to his stammering, he was not able to get selected in the groups. After completing his degree, he decided to pursue his dream by becoming an actor. Loads of rejections hindered his way due to his speaking disorder. He changed his drawback into an advantage by giving us the comical delight Mr.Bean, which is a strange, surreal and Non-Speaking character. He proved that, even without a handsome face and heroic body, a person can become the most loved personality in the field of cinema. The way he faced all the rejections and still had the courage to move on in life really inspired me!
