Jeremy Dyson
Encyclopedia
Jeremy Dyson is an English
screenwriter and, along with Mark Gatiss
, Steve Pemberton
and Reece Shearsmith
, a participant in The League of Gentlemen
.
, Yorkshire
, England
, son of Elaine Saville and Melvin Dyson. He has one older brother, Andrew Dyson, and a younger sister, Jane Dyson. He studied Philosophy
at the University of Leeds
and later completed an MA in screenwriting at the Northern School of Film and Television
. He lived in Highbury
, London
, but now lives in Ilkley
, West Yorkshire
.
He has written several books including Bright Darkness: Lost Art of the Supernatural Horror Film, a non-fiction guide to horror films, and two collections of short stories entitled Never Trust a Rabbit - shortlisted for the Macmillan Silver Pen award - and The Cranes That Build The Cranes which won the 2010 Edge Hill award. His novel What Happens Now was published on 6 April 2006 to favourable reviews and was nominated for the Goss first novel award.
He has co-created (with Simon Ashdown
) the BAFTA nominated television series Funland
, which aired on BBC Three
, and wrote the Billy Goats Gruff episode of the BBC's 2008 series Fairy Tales.
He has also worked as script editor and writer on BBC1’s BAFTA award winning The Armstrong and Miller Show
(2007-2010), where he created the licentious Flanders & Swann parodying Brabbins & Fyffe, accident prone historian Dennis Lincoln Park, disapproving lingerie saleswomen Lisa & Yvonne and the ‘Kill Them’ sketches amongst others.
He is also the script editor of BBC2 sitcom Grandma's House
(2010).
Due to his self-confessed lack of acting skills, he does not appear in The League of Gentlemen television series or any of its offshoots, apart from very brief cameos. He worked as the assistant producer instead. In the film adaptation he is played by Michael Sheen
, although Dyson appears in the background of a few scenes.
Dyson has an interest in the supernatural fiction
of English
writer Robert Aickman
and has adapted Aickman's work in a number of media.
Alongside his writing work, Dyson also plays keyboards in a pop band called Rudolf Rocker
. They are based in Leeds and signed to Mook Records. Their best known album, The Exotic Sounds of Rudolf Rocker, features the single "Samba Suit". They can be found on the internet at http://www.myspace.com/rudolfrocker. Dyson had previously been a member of Leeds band Flowers For Agatha
in the 1980s.
He is also a patron of the charity No Panic.
With Andy Nyman
, he co-wrote and co-directed the supernatural-themed stage production Ghost Stories
. The play broke box office records at the Liverpool Playhouse
and Lyric Hammersmith
theatres where had its first run between February and April 2010 and transferred to the Duke of York's Theatre
in the West End in June 2010 where it ran for thirteen months. In January 2011, he returned to the Lyric Hammersmith with Roald Dahl's Twisted Tales, the first stage adaptation of Roald Dahl
's short stories Tales of the Unexpected
.
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
screenwriter and, along with Mark Gatiss
Mark Gatiss
Mark Gatiss is an English actor, screenwriter and novelist. He is best known as a member of the comedy team The League of Gentlemen, and has both written for and acted in the TV series Doctor Who and Sherlock....
, Steve Pemberton
Steve Pemberton
Steve James Pemberton is an English actor, comedian, writer and performer, most famous as a member of The League of Gentlemen along with fellow performers Reece Shearsmith, Mark Gatiss and co-writer Jeremy Dyson.-Early life:...
and Reece Shearsmith
Reece Shearsmith
Reeson "Reece" Shearsmith is an English actor and writer. He is most famous for his work as part of The League of Gentlemen along with fellow performers Steve Pemberton, Mark Gatiss and co-writer Jeremy Dyson.-Early life:...
, a participant in The League of Gentlemen
The League of Gentlemen (comedy)
The League of Gentlemen are a quartet of British dark comedy writers/performers, formed in 1995 by Jeremy Dyson, Mark Gatiss, Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith...
.
Early life
Dyson was born in LeedsLeeds
Leeds is a city and metropolitan borough in West Yorkshire, England. In 2001 Leeds' main urban subdivision had a population of 443,247, while the entire city has a population of 798,800 , making it the 30th-most populous city in the European Union.Leeds is the cultural, financial and commercial...
, Yorkshire
Yorkshire
Yorkshire is a historic county of northern England and the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its great size in comparison to other English counties, functions have been increasingly undertaken over time by its subdivisions, which have also been subject to periodic reform...
, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
, son of Elaine Saville and Melvin Dyson. He has one older brother, Andrew Dyson, and a younger sister, Jane Dyson. He studied Philosophy
Philosophy
Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...
at the University of Leeds
University of Leeds
The University of Leeds is a British Redbrick university located in the city of Leeds, West Yorkshire, England...
and later completed an MA in screenwriting at the Northern School of Film and Television
Northern Film School
The Northern Film School is part of the Leeds Metropolitan University faculty of Film, Television and Performing Arts. It is one of the largest full-time film schools in the UK with both bachelors and masters degrees, and it is situated in the city centre of Leeds.-History:As far back as the late...
. He lived in Highbury
Highbury
- Early Highbury :The area now known as Islington was part of the larger manor of Tolentone, which is mentioned in the Domesday Book. Tolentone was owned by Ranulf brother of Ilger and included all the areas north and east of Canonbury and Holloway Road. The manor house was situated by what is now...
, London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, but now lives in Ilkley
Ilkley
Ilkley is a spa town and civil parish in West Yorkshire, in the north of England. Ilkley civil parish includes the adjacent village of Ben Rhydding and is a ward within the metropolitan borough of Bradford. Approximately north of Bradford, the town lies mainly on the south bank of the River Wharfe...
, West Yorkshire
West Yorkshire
West Yorkshire is a metropolitan county within the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England with a population of 2.2 million. West Yorkshire came into existence as a metropolitan county in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972....
.
Career
He is best known as co-creator of the hit West End play Ghost Stories and as a member of the sketch comedy team The League of Gentlemen, along with fellow performers Mark Gatiss, Steve Pemberton, and Reece Shearsmith, all of whom he met while they were studying at Bretton Hall drama school. The League of Gentlemen initially began as a stage act in 1995, transferred to BBC Radio 4 as On the Town with the League of Gentlemen in 1997, and then arrived on television on BBC Two in 1999. The latter saw Dyson and his colleagues awarded a British Academy Television Award, a Royal Television Society Award and the prestigious Golden Rose of Montreux.He has written several books including Bright Darkness: Lost Art of the Supernatural Horror Film, a non-fiction guide to horror films, and two collections of short stories entitled Never Trust a Rabbit - shortlisted for the Macmillan Silver Pen award - and The Cranes That Build The Cranes which won the 2010 Edge Hill award. His novel What Happens Now was published on 6 April 2006 to favourable reviews and was nominated for the Goss first novel award.
He has co-created (with Simon Ashdown
Simon Ashdown
Simon Ashdown is a British television writer, best known as being a BAFTA award-nominated EastEnders writer.Ashdown is currently series consultant and lead writer on EastEnders. He was involved in the creation of the Slater family, and along with other writers, developed the characters around the...
) the BAFTA nominated television series Funland
Funland
Funland is a comedy / thriller serial, produced by the BBC that was first screened from Sunday 23 October 2005 to Monday 7 November 2005 , on the digital channel BBC Three...
, which aired on BBC Three
BBC Three
BBC Three is a television network from the BBC broadcasting via digital cable, terrestrial, IPTV and satellite platforms. The channel's target audience includes those in the 16-34 year old age group, and has the purpose of providing "innovative" content to younger audiences, focusing on new talent...
, and wrote the Billy Goats Gruff episode of the BBC's 2008 series Fairy Tales.
He has also worked as script editor and writer on BBC1’s BAFTA award winning The Armstrong and Miller Show
The Armstrong and Miller Show
The Armstrong and Miller Show is a British sketch comedy television show produced by Hat Trick Productions for BBC One. It features the double act Armstrong and Miller and a number of notable scriptwriters including Andy Hamilton and The League of Gentlemen's Jeremy Dyson.The series followed four...
(2007-2010), where he created the licentious Flanders & Swann parodying Brabbins & Fyffe, accident prone historian Dennis Lincoln Park, disapproving lingerie saleswomen Lisa & Yvonne and the ‘Kill Them’ sketches amongst others.
He is also the script editor of BBC2 sitcom Grandma's House
Grandma's House
Grandma's House is a sitcom television series for BBC Two. Written by Simon Amstell and long term collaborator Dan Swimer, the series stars Simon Amstell playing a version of himself: a television presenter searching for meaning in his life...
(2010).
Due to his self-confessed lack of acting skills, he does not appear in The League of Gentlemen television series or any of its offshoots, apart from very brief cameos. He worked as the assistant producer instead. In the film adaptation he is played by Michael Sheen
Michael Sheen
Michael Christopher Sheen, OBE , is a Welsh stage and screen actor. He trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London, England and made his professional debut opposite Vanessa Redgrave in When She Danced at the Globe Theatre in 1991...
, although Dyson appears in the background of a few scenes.
Dyson has an interest in the supernatural fiction
Supernatural fiction
Supernatural fiction is a literary genre exploiting or requiring as plot devices or themes some contradictions of the commonplace natural world and materialist assumptions about it....
of English
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
writer Robert Aickman
Robert Aickman
Robert Fordyce Aickman was an English conservationist and writer of fiction and nonfiction. As a writer, he is best known for his supernatural fiction, which he described as "strange stories".-Life:...
and has adapted Aickman's work in a number of media.
Alongside his writing work, Dyson also plays keyboards in a pop band called Rudolf Rocker
Rudolf Rocker
Johann Rudolf Rocker was an anarcho-syndicalist writer and activist. A self-professed anarchist without adjectives, Rocker believed that anarchist schools of thought represented "only different methods of economy" and that the first objective for anarchists was "to secure the personal and social...
. They are based in Leeds and signed to Mook Records. Their best known album, The Exotic Sounds of Rudolf Rocker, features the single "Samba Suit". They can be found on the internet at http://www.myspace.com/rudolfrocker. Dyson had previously been a member of Leeds band Flowers For Agatha
Flowers For Agatha
Flowers for Agatha was a band based in Leeds, England, in the 1980s. It was formed by Jon Roberts, and among its other members was Jeremy Dyson who later became known for his being a member of the team who wrote The League of Gentlemen. Jeremy joined Jon's three-piece version of the band in early...
in the 1980s.
He is also a patron of the charity No Panic.
With Andy Nyman
Andy Nyman
Andy Nyman is an English actor and magician.Nyman first came to note with his performance as a hard nosed director in Musical! and then as Keith Whitehead in the cult film of the Martin Amis novel, Dead Babies...
, he co-wrote and co-directed the supernatural-themed stage production Ghost Stories
Ghost Stories (play)
Ghost Stories is a play written by Jeremy Dyson and Andy Nyman . It premiered at the Liverpool Playhouse in February 2010 before being transferred for a longer run at the Lyric Hammersmith in London...
. The play broke box office records at the Liverpool Playhouse
Liverpool Playhouse
The Liverpool Playhouse is a theatre in Williamson Square in the city of Liverpool, Merseyside, England. It originated in 1866 as a music hall, and in 1911 developed into a repertory theatre. As such it nurtured the early careers of many actors and actresses, some of which went on to achieve...
and Lyric Hammersmith
Lyric Hammersmith
The Lyric Theatre, also known as the Lyric Hammersmith, is a theatre on King Street, in the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham, which takes pride in its original, "groundbreaking" productions....
theatres where had its first run between February and April 2010 and transferred to the Duke of York's Theatre
Duke of York's Theatre
The Duke of York's Theatre is a West End Theatre in St Martin's Lane, in the City of Westminster. It was built for Frank Wyatt and his wife, Violet Melnotte, who retained ownership of the theatre, until her death in 1935. It opened on 10 September 1892 as the Trafalgar Square Theatre, with Wedding...
in the West End in June 2010 where it ran for thirteen months. In January 2011, he returned to the Lyric Hammersmith with Roald Dahl's Twisted Tales, the first stage adaptation of Roald Dahl
Roald Dahl
Roald Dahl was a British novelist, short story writer, fighter pilot and screenwriter.Born in Wales to Norwegian parents, he served in the Royal Air Force during the Second World War, in which he became a flying ace and intelligence agent, rising to the rank of Wing Commander...
's short stories Tales of the Unexpected
Tales of the Unexpected
Tales of the Unexpected may refer to:*Tales of the Unexpected , a 1950s-1960s comic book*Tales of the Unexpected , a collection of short stories by Roald Dahl...
.