Craig Ferguson
(born May 17, 1962) is a Scottish-American television host, stand-up comedian, writer, director, and actor. Holding multiple citizenship, he is both a naturalized citizen of the United States and a citizen of the United Kingdom. He is the present host of CBS's The Late Late Show
, a role that earned him an Emmy nomination in 2006. [1]
Before his career as a late-night talk-show host, Ferguson was best known in the United States for his role as the office boss, Nigel Wick, on The Drew Carey Show
from 1996 to 2003. He is the author of the 2006 novel Between the Bridge and the River.
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UK career
Ferguson's experience in entertainment began as a drummer in a rock band called Exposure. He then joined a
punk band called "The Bastards from Hell."
[2] The band, later renamed "Dreamboys," performed regularly in Glasgow from 1980 to 1982.
Ferguson got his start as a comedian in the
United Kingdom, appearing on the
alternative comedy circuit under the stage-name "Bing Hitler".
[3] A recording of his stage act as Bing Hitler was made at Glasgow's Tron Theatre and released in the 1980s. In addition, a Bing Hitler monologue ("A Lecture for Burns Night") appears on the compilation cassette
Honey at the Core.
Ferguson toured the UK during the late '80s under his own name as a support act to
Harry Enfield.
Craig has also found success in musical theatre. Beginning in 1991 he appeared on stage as Brad Majors in the London production of
The Rocky Horror Show, alongside
Anthony Stewart Head who was playing Dr. Frank-N-Furter at the time. The same year he appeared at the
Edinburgh Fringe as Oscar Madison in
The Odd Couple
, opposite
Gerard Kelly as Felix. The play, which was relocated to 1990s Glasgow, later toured Scotland.In 1994 Craig played "Father Maclean" in the highly controversial production of
Bad Boy Johnny and the Prophets of Doom at the
Union Chapel in London. Due to the fact it was performed in a practicing church, the production was closed down after just ten performances.
After enjoying success at the
Edinburgh Festival, Ferguson broke into television with appearances on
Red Dwarf,
STV's
Hogmanay Show
,
[4] his own show
2000 Not Out
, and the 1993
One Foot in the Grave
Christmas special
One Foot in the Algarve.
In 1993, Ferguson presented his own series on Scottish archaeology for
Scottish Television entitled
Dirt Detective.
[5] He traveled throughout the country examining archaeological history, including
Skara Brae and
Paisley Abbey.
US career
After cancellation of his show
The Ferguson Theory
, Ferguson moved to Los Angeles in 1994. His first U.S. role was as baker Logan McDonough on the short-lived 1995
ABC comedy
Maybe This Time,
which starred
Betty White and
Marie Osmond.
His breakthrough in the U.S. came when he was cast as the title character's boss, Mr. Wick, on
The Drew Carey Show,
a role which he played from 1996 to 2003. He played the role with an over-the-top posh English accent "to make up for generations of English actors doing crap Scottish accents." His character was memorable for his unique methods of laying employees off, almost always 'firing Johnson', the most common last name of the to-be-fired workers.
[6]
During this time he also wrote and starred in three films:
The Big Tease
,
Saving Grace
, and
I'll Be There
, which he also directed and for which he won the Audience Award for Best Film at the Aspen, Dallas and Valencia film festivals. He was named Best New Director at the Napa Valley Film Festival.
His other acting credits in films include
Niagara Motel
,
Lenny the Wonder Dog
,
Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events
,
Chain of Fools
, and
Born Romantic.
The Late Late Show
In December 2004, it was announced that Ferguson would be the successor to
Craig Kilborn on
CBS's
The Late Late Show.
His first show as the regular host aired on January 3, 2005. By May 2008, Ben Alba, an American television historian and an authority on U.S. talk shows, said Ferguson "has already made his mark, taking the TV
monologue to new levels with an underlying story. But he is only just starting ...He is making up his own rules: It's the immigrant experience."
The Late Late Show
averaged 2.0 million viewers in its 2007 season, compared with 2.5 million for
Late Night with Conan O'Brien.
[7] In April 2008,
The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson
beat
Late Night with Conan O'Brien
for weekly ratings (1.88 million to 1.77 million) for the first time since the two shows went head-to-head with their respective hosts.
[8]
His success on the show has led at least one "television insider" to say he's the heir-apparent to take over
David Letterman's role as host of
The Late Show.
One of Ferguson's writers on the show, Philip McGrade, said that Americans had warmed to his confessional style; commenting on Ferguson's greater success in the US, McGrade said that Americans were more receptive to
working-class comics than were British audiences. His monologues are famous for starting with "It's a great day for America, everybody."
Television and appearances
- Craig Ferguson has made guest appearances on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno
, the Late Show with David Letterman
, Late Night with Conan O'Brien
, Rachael Ray
, Howard Stern, The Daily Show
, The View
, Loveline
, Real Time with Bill Maher
, The Soup
, and The Dennis Miller Show
. He also co-hosted Live with Regis & Kelly
with Kelly Ripa.
- On January 4, 2009, Ferguson was a celebrity player on Million Dollar Password
.
- In 2009, Ferguson made a cameo, live-action appearance in the episode We Love You, Conrad
in Family Guy
.
- Ferguson played Ted Truman in the indie film Trust Me.
In the Red Dwarf
episode "Confidence and Paranoia", he played "Confidence," a character who personified the concept.
- Ferguson hosted the 32nd annual People's Choice Awards on January 10, 2006. [9] TV Guide
magazine printed a "Cheers" (Cheers and Jeers section) for appearing on his own show that same evening.
- From 2007 to 2009, Ferguson hosted the Boston Pops Fireworks Spectacular on July 4, broadcast nationally by CBS.
- Ferguson was the featured entertainer at the April 26, 2008 White House Correspondents' Association dinner in Washington, DC [10] where he criticized the New York Times for not sending a representative to the banquet and told them to "shut the hell up...you sanctimonious, whining jerks."
- Ferguson co-presented the Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama with Brooke Shields in 2008, where Ferguson was involved in a joke about the touching of Shields' butt. When asked a few days later by Denis Leary, Craig confirmed that he did in fact had his hand on Shields' behind during the joke (although it remains to be seen if he was actually joking).
- He has done voice work in cartoons, including being the voice of Barry's evil alter-ego in the "With Friends Like Steve's" episode of American Dad
and a character named Roddy MacStew on Freakazoid.
- He continues to make standup appearances in Las Vegas and New York City. He headlined in the Just for Laughs festival in Montreal and in October 2008 Ferguson taped his stand up show in Boston for a Comedy Central special entitled A Wee Bit o' Revolution,
which aired on March 22, 2009.
Literature
- Ferguson's novel Between the Bridge and the River
(ISBN 9780811853750) was published on April 10, 2006. Ferguson appeared at the Los Angeles Festival of Books, as well as other author literary events. "This book could scare them", Ferguson said. "The sex, the violence, the dream sequences and the iconoclasm. I think a lot of people are uncomfortable with that. I understand that. It was very uncomfortable to write some of it." Publishers Weekly
called it "a tour de force
of cynical humor and poignant reverie, a caustic yet ebullient picaresque that approaches the sacred by way of the profane." His novel Between the Bridge and the River
is dedicated to his son and to his grandfather, Adam. Craig revealed in an interview that he is writing a sequel to the book, to be titled "The Sphynx of the Mississippi" [11]
- Ferguson has signed a deal with HarperCollins to publish his memoirs in fall 2009. [12] The book, tentatively titled American on Purpose
, will focus on "how and why [he] became an American" and cover his years as a punk rocker, a dancer, a bouncer and a construction worker. [13]
- In July 2009, Jackie Collins was a guest on The Late Late Show to promote her new book Married Lovers.
Collins said that a character in her book, Don Verona, was based on Craig because she was such a fan of him and his show. [14]
- , (ISBN 0811858197 Paperback)
- [15]
Personal life
Ferguson was born in
Glasgow,
Scotland, to Robert and Janet Ferguson, and raised in nearby
Cumbernauld.
[16] He claimed in one episode of the
Late Late Show
to have been raised Scottish Presbyterian. His paternal grandfather was a Scottish Protestant and his paternal grandmother was an Irish Catholic.
In an episode of
The Late Late Show
which aired December 8, 2008, a somber Ferguson talked about his recently deceased mother, Janet (August 3, 1933–December 1, 2008). He ended the program by playing her favorite song, "
Rivers of Babylon" by
Boney M. [17]
Ferguson has two sisters (one older and one younger) and one older brother.
[18] His sister,
Lynn Ferguson, is a successful comedian, presenter and actress, perhaps most widely known as the voice of Mac in
Chicken Run
. She is currently a writer on "The Late Late Show". His brother, Scott, worked for
STV, and is married to actress Teri Lally. His elder sister, Janice, is a successful businesswoman and fellowship member of the Institution of Occupational Safety and Health (
IOSH).
His first visit to the
United States was to visit an uncle who lived on
Long Island, near New York City, as a teenager.
Later, he lived in
New York City, where he worked in construction in
Harlem. Ferguson said that he "used to be a bouncer at a cool club in
New York called Save the Robots. That was the name of the club. I was the bouncer the first couple of weeks. I got fired. I was power crazed. I was acting like a goblin from
The Lord of the Rings
."
[19]
Ferguson has married three times and divorced twice as a result of what he describes as "Relationship Issues." From his second marriage (to Sascha Corwin, founder and proprietor of Los Angeles' SpySchool) he has one son, Milo Hamish Ferguson, born in 2001. He and Corwin share custody of Milo, live near each other in LA and remain good friends. On December 21, 2008, Ferguson married art dealer Megan Wallace-Cunningham in a private ceremony on her family's farm in
Chester, Vermont.
[20]
A recovering alcoholic, Ferguson has been sober since February 18, 1992.
[21] He said he had considered committing suicide on
Christmas Day 1991, but when offered a drink by a friend, Tommy the Irishman,
[22] for celebrating the holiday, he forgot to jump off
Tower Bridge in
London as he had planned.
As mentioned on
The Late Late Show
on August, 3, 2009 Ferguson holds an
FAA Private Pilot License issued on July 31, 2009.
[23]
Citizenship
During 2007, Ferguson, who at the time held only
British citizenship, used
The Late Late Show
as a forum for seeking
honorary citizenship from every state in the U.S. He received honorary citizenship from
Nebraska,
Arkansas,
Virginia,
Montana,
North Dakota,
New Jersey,
Tennessee,
South Carolina,
South Dakota,
Nevada,
Alaska,
Texas,
Wyoming,
Pennsylvania, and
Indiana, and was "commissioned" as an
admiral in the tongue-in-cheek Nebraska Navy.
[24] Governors
Jon Corzine,
John Hoeven,
Mark Sanford,
Mike Rounds,
Rick Perry,
Sarah Palin [25] and
Jim Gibbons sent letters to him that made him an honorary citizen of their respective states. He received as well similar honors from various towns and cities, including
Ozark, Arkansas,
Hazard, Kentucky and
Greensburg, Pennsylvania.
In January 2008 Ferguson announced in a
Late Late Show
episode (aired on Tuesday, the 22nd) that he was scheduled to take his citizenship test in Los Angeles on the 25th, a Friday; the next Monday he announced that he had received a perfect score, and footage of this showed him doing so. Rather than ignoring the cameras, he made jokes in some of his answers. For example, to give the name of the writer of
The Star-Spangled Banner
, he replied, "
Francis Scott Key... and
Puff Daddy." Ferguson became an American citizen on February 1, 2008.
[26] His show aired clips from his citizenship ceremony on the fourth of that month.
On 27 June, 2009, after a USO-tour performance in Kosovo, he was given honorary citizenship to
Camp Bondsteel there.
Filmography
- The Bogie Man
(1992)
- The Drew Carey Show
(1996–2004)
- The Big Tease
(1999) Writer
- Chain of Fools
(2000)
- Born Romantic
(2000)
- Saving Grace
(2000) Writer, Actor
- I'll Be There
(2003) Director, Screenwriter, Actor
- Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events
(2004)
- Lenny the Wonder Dog
(2004)
- The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson
(2005–present)
- Niagara Motel
(2006)
- Trust Me
(2006)
- Craig Ferguson A Wee Bit o'Revolution
(2008)
- The Ugly Truth
(2009)
- The Hero of Color City
(2010)
- How to Train Your Dragon
(2010)
References
- ACADEMY OF TELEVISION ARTS AND SCIENCES: 58TH PRIMETIME EMMY AWARDS
- Craig Ferguson
- Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me!
- Craig Ferguson stand-up comedy clip
- Craig Ferguson in Dirt Detective
- Craig Ferguson 'may be next Letterman'. ''The Sunday Times.''
- Jay and Conan Rule The Late-Night Week, Stretching Their Year-Ago Leads
- Ferguson beats Conan in ratings for 1st time
- Ferguson to host U.S. "People's Choice Awards" show
- Bush pokes fun at his successors
- http://www.chroniclebooks.com/Chronicle/excerpt/0811853756a.html
- "Craig Ferguson set to pen memoirs." ''Variety''. May 2008.
- American on Purpose: Book Description
- Craig Ferguson 7/21/9F Late Late Show Jackie Collins
- http://www.amazon.com/American-Purpose-Improbable-Adventures-Unlikely/dp/0061719544/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UT
- Craig Ferguson Eulogizes his Father
- Title Unavailable
- Craig Ferguson Biography
- Craig Ferguson on ''The Late Late Show,'' October 10, 2006
- Craig Ferguson Biography
- Title Unavailable
- YouTube Ferguson Speaks From The Heart
- Title Unavailable
- "Nebraska honors 'Late Late Show' host Craig Ferguson.", ''AccessMyLibrary''
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yh-lW2opLyQ
- Craig Ferguson passes citizenship test