ROBERT LLEWELLYN
Robert Llewellyn was born in 1956, went to school just outside Northampton and in the small market town of Witney, West Oxfordshire. After being thrown out of Henry Box school age 15, due to a misunderstanding over general discipline and hair length, he became a hippy leather worker. Aged 18 became an apprentice shoemaker with James Taylor and Son, bespoke shoemakers in Marylebone, London. He then bought a 5 ton furniture truck, converted it into a house and spent 2 years 'on the road,' working on film locations as a runner, a model for painters, a geodesic dome builder and part time tree surgeon.
During this time Robert helped organise a few amateur cabaret evenings in a riverside warehouse over looking Tower Bridge in London. The shows were a great success and he eventually helped form an 'alternative comedy' theatre group called The Joeys. Within six months he had stopped making shoes and started performing professionally.
For the following five years he toured Britain and Europe with the Joeys, performing an average of 250 shows a year. The content of the performances was very strongly linked with the male response to feminism, to 'anti sexism' and 'anti racism.' The Joeys made numerous television appearances and ran sell out shows at Edinburgh Festival for three years.
In 1985-86 Robert co-wrote and co-starred in a Channel 4 sit com called The Cornerhouse. It was broadcast in 1987. It was not a critical success but a very deep learning experience. Robert went to America shortly after it's broadcast where he met a screen-writer who encouraged him to write more. On his return to Britain, apart from working in Rep theatre, Robert performed mainly as a stand up comic for a year and then wrote and produced a comic play titled Mammon, Robot Born of Woman. Premiered in the 1988 Edinburgh festival, it won many awards. The following year Robert co wrote and performed a play about pornography called Onan. The play was a sell out at the 1989 Edinburgh festival. That year also saw the start of Robert's involvement with the BBC comedy series, Red Dwarf.
'The Man in The Rubber Mask' a biographical account of his time appearing in Red Dwarf, was published by Penguin books in '94. That year Robert wrote and presented a six part series titled I-Camcorder, for Channel 4, a comic but information packed series which attempted to show you 'how to stop boring your friends and family with your home videos.' While spending 6 months living in Australia Robert then wrote a biography of his misspent youth, Thin He Was And Filthy Haired and Therapy and How To Avoid It co-written with Nigel Planer, both, published in September 96. The same month also saw the arrival of Robert's daughter, Holly Matilda.