Jimmy Carr

 ( Official Website ) 

Carr spent most of his early life in the village of Farnham Common, Buckinghamshire, where he attended Farnham Common School and Burnham Grammar School. Carr was diagnosed with dyslexia and could not read or write at his expected level until around ten or eleven years old. He completed sixth form at the Royal Grammar School in nearby High Wycombe.Jimmy Carr, Desert Island Discs, BBC Radio 4 (Mar 2017)

In 2001, Carr's mother, Nora Mary, died of pancreatitis, at age 57. Following her death, Carr's relationship with his father became "severely strained". In 2004, his father was arrested and accused of harassing Carr and his brother Colin, but was cleared and won an apology from the Metropolitan Police. "Standard pay out to Jimmy Carr's estranged father", Press Gazette, 21 September 2006. Retrieved 20 November 2022 In 2021, Carr said he had not spoken to his father since 2000 and had not seen him in person, with the exception of an autograph signing after a gig in 2015, where they saw each other but did not speak.

After earning four A grades at A-Level, Carr studied social science and political science at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge. He graduated with first-class honours in 1994. He went on to work in the marketing department at Shell, but took voluntary redundancy in January 2000 as he felt "miserable" there. He performed his first paid stand-up gig later that month, having done his debut pub show unpaid only the previous December. He claimed that a course in neuro-linguistic programming helped him realize how his mind was working to hold him back from following his dreams of becoming a comedian.

Since 2005, Carr has presented the comedy panel show 8 Out of 10 Cats. The show aired on Channel 4 until 2016, when it moved to More4. It later went to E4. Since 2012, Carr has also presented over 150 episodes of 8 Out of 10 Cats Does Countdown, a combination of his panel show 8 Out of 10 Cats and daytime quiz show Countdown.

In April 2010, Carr hosted the first British version of a comedy roast show, Channel 4's A Comedy Roast. On 6 May 2010, he was a co-host of Channel 4's Alternative Election Night, with David Mitchell, Lauren Laverne and Charlie Brooker. He joined the three presenters again for 10 O'Clock Live, a Channel 4 comedy current-affairs show, which started airing in January 2011.

In 2014 and 2015, Carr guest-presented two episodes of Sunday Night at the Palladium on ITV. In 2018, he presented American comedy panel show The Fix on Netflix. From 2018 to 2020, Carr hosted the Comedy Central series Roast Battle. From 2021 he has hosted the Channel 4 quiz show I Literally Just Told You.

In March 2025, he hosted the first series of with Roisin Conaty.

Carr has appeared as a contestant on celebrity editions of Deal or No Deal (won £750 for Helen & Douglas House), The Chase (won £1,000 for Variety Club), Benchmark (won £1,000 for Elton John AIDS Foundation), Tipping Point (won £7,000 for Blue Cross), Catchphrase, and Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, winning £1,000.

Carr was a guest presenter for one edition of Have I Got News for You; in 2007 he joined Ian Hislop's team in the edition of the show chaired by Ann Widdecombe, with whom he "flirted" outrageously. Later in the episode, Widdecombe stated, "I don't think I shall return to this programme."

Carr has appeared on BBC Radio 4's Museum of Curiosity a total of seven times since 2011. He was the Museum Curator (in his five appearances in 2012) and a guest on the 2018 Annual Stock Take Christmas special, alongside Lee Mack, Jo Brand and Sally Phillips.

His first five minutes of stand-up (unpaid) was at an Islington pub, the Tut 'n' Shive, in December 1999. From 2000 to 2003, he started appearing regularly, around London, at Up The Creek, The Banana Cabaret and The Bearcat Comedy Club.

He performed a revue at the Café Royal, as a part of the 2001 Edinburgh Fringe. Titled Rubbernecker, it also featured Ricky Gervais, Stephen Merchant and Robin Ince.

In 2004, he threatened to sue Jim Davidson for using a joke that Carr considered his own. The matter was dropped when it became apparent that the joke in question was an old one used for decades by many different comedians. He toured the country with his show A Public Display of Affection, starting on 9 April 2005 at the Gulbenkian Theatre in Canterbury and ending on 14 January 2006 at the Gielgud Theatre in London's West End. He also appeared at the EICC during the Edinburgh Festival in August 2005 with his Off The Telly show.

In August 2006, he commenced the tour Gag Reflex, for which he won the 2006 British Comedy Award for "Best Live Stand-Up". He released his third DVD, Jimmy Carr: Comedian, in November 2007. In 2003, he was listed in the Observer as one of the 50 funniest acts in British comedy. In 2007, a poll on the Channel 4 website for 100 Greatest Stand-Ups, Jimmy Carr was 12th. A national tour commenced in autumn 2007 named Repeat Offender, beginning at the Edinburgh Festival.

On 3 February 2007, Carr's performance in front of 50 people in London was broadcast simultaneously on the virtual platform Second Life.

His Rapier Wit tour opened on 20 August 2009 eight shows at the Edinburgh Festival before touring the UK. He released a DVD entitled Jimmy Carr: Telling Jokes on 2 November 2009. Also on 5 and 6 July 2009, Carr was the warm up act for Las Vegas band the Killers at their DVD record gigs (Live from the Royal Albert Hall).

In October 2009, Carr received criticism from Sunday tabloid newspapers for a joke he made about British soldiers who had lost limbs in Iraq and Afghanistan, saying the UK would have a strong team in the London 2012 Paralympic Games. Carr defended his own joke as "totally acceptable" in an interview with The Guardian. He had met with staff and patients at the rehabilitation centre, Headley Court, in March 2009.

Carr's sixth Live DVD, Jimmy Carr: Making People Laugh, was released on 8 November 2010. Carr's 2010–11 tour, entitled Laughter Therapy, started with a run at the Edinburgh Festival before touring the UK.

Carr was criticised in November 2011 for a joke about the Variety Club's Sunshine coaches, which offer holidays for children with Down syndrome. The charity and Down Syndrome Education International condemned the joke. Carr defended himself by saying nothing should be off limits.

A Guardian profile in 2012 said: "In terms of reach and earning power... one of the nation's most popular stand-up comedians... in his ability to pull in crowds which generate millions in tour and DVD sales..." and as "the undisputed king of deadpan one-liners...".

Carr released the Jimmy Carr: Laughing and Joking DVD on 18 November 2013.

In June 2019, Carr was criticised for the content of his touring show Terribly Funny. Among the controversial jokes were jokes about dwarves, fat women and female genital mutilation. Carr was also criticised by charity Little People UK (co-founded by actor Warwick Davis), accusing him of prejudice for an "offensive" abortion joke he made about people with dwarfism.

On 17 April 2024, the Netflix recording of Carr's Terribly Funny 2.0 tour was released as Natural Born Killer. The one hour special attained a Top 10 spot in 29 countries. In the week 15–21 April 2024 Netflix listed the show as being 8th in the global Top 10 (in the category TV, English) with 2.3 million viewing hours.

In September and October 2024, Carr joined Australian comedian Jim Jefferies for a number of joint gigs, slotted between dates for Jefferies's own tour, in Canada. Their shows were billed as The Charm Offensive Tour.

Carr has said that he first went up to Edinburgh around 2000 to "see what it was about". Although he would eventually go on to return each year as a paid stand-up comic, he initially had to resort to trying to save money by sleeping in his car (a Rover 75) or on the floor of somewhere that other comedians had rented.

The August 2001 two-week stint, with Rubbernecker, was Carr's first Fringe appearance, with his name in the official programme and his first mention on the Comedy site Chortle.

In 2002, although this was Carr's second entry (in one of the festival's programmes) this was his first solo show: Bare Faced Ambition. This was the year that he received a nomination for what was then known as the Perrier Award.

The poster and programme billed him as "England's answer to Emo Philips", and he performed in the Dining Room of the Gilded Balloon from 2 to 26 August.

By the time of 2003's Festival, the now 30-year-old Carr had built a larger fan base through touring, several appearances at Montreal's Just For Laughs and numerous TV appearances (including co-hosting Your Face Or Mine).  This enabled him to move his shows to the larger venue of the The Pleasance, but the Festival's rules (on TV appearances) meant that he was judged to now be a "star" and therefore could not be nominated for the 2003 Perrier Award.

He performed for 25 nights between 30 July and 25 August 2003. On August 21 and 22nd, he participated in Comedy Gala 2003 in aid of Waverley Care.

Edinburgh 2004 followed on from another hit TV show ( Distraction); this tour show was called Public Display of Affection. This meant another move up (in venue size) with six shows at the EICC (which had a 1,200-seat capacity at that time).

2005 was Carr's fifth Fringe and he again arrived with all-new material. This show was called Off The Telly, and, returning to the EICC, he performed eight shows.

Material for the new tour, named Gag Reflex, had been tried out at a WIP (Work in progress) gig at the Hen and Chickens on August 5, 2006. Trial of the new material continued in Edinburgh across six nights, from August 17, at the EICC.

Carr only managed to fit in a brief appearance at the 2007 Fringe on August 21. Held at the Edinburgh Festival Theatre, it was a regular Fringe fund raiser, headed by Alan Carr, for Waverley Care. He was still writing material for his planned Repeat Offender tour, as evidenced by him using a clipboard on stage.

Previously, The Guardian had been reasonably positive in relation to reviews of comedians headlining at the Fringe; however, articles from 2007 declared that "household names were drowning out more pioneering art".

The 2008 Edinburgh programme never listed dates or a venue for Carr's shows this year; this was possibly because his attendance was confirmed after printing. His presence (and the unveiling of his Joke Technician tour) was, however, mentioned in The Independent and also Chortle.

Edinburgh 2009 saw Carr return for what is billed as his "eighth solo show", thereby confirming his seventh attendance in 2008. He returned to the EICC with his new show, Rapier Wit, for eight nights spanning 20 to 30 August.

He also attended the Edinburgh International Television Festival to be a Judge on a Britain's Got Talent spoof (called TV's Got Talent) alongside Amanda Holden and Louis Walsh.

Edinburgh 2010 sees Carr debut his new show, Laughter Therapy, a few days after the end of his Rapier Wit tour. He was back at the EICC for eight nights.

Although he performed a number of gigs in Scotland, during 2011, Carr never made it to that year's Festival. At Edinburgh 2012, he was back to perform his new show, Gagging Order, with six nights at the EICC.

2014 saw Carr return for his 11th solo Edinburgh show, called Funny Business. Based once again at the EICC he played four nights in what would appear to be his last Fringe appearance (with a comedy show).

In August 2017, Carr returned for a different kind of Edinburgh Festival: the Edinburgh International Television Festival. He interviewed Comedy Central President, Kent Alterman, in an on-stage Q&A session in front of industry staff.

After a 10-year absence Carr returned for his 12th solo show ( Laughs Funny), in August 2024. He described the Festival as being " where it all began" and performed 5 shows, across 3 nights, at the Edinburgh Playhouse.

His first venture into making TV shows in the US was The Strategic Humour Initiative (hosted by David Frost) back in 2003. It was a joint UK–USA–Canada production, and Carr was chosen to be the UK comedian. Only 1 episode was made.

2005 saw Carr hosting 12 episodes of the American version of the shock gameshow Distraction (which he had hosted in the UK). A second US series (14 episodes) was commissioned in 2006.

Comedy Central (US) made two episodes of in 2005 and 2009.

Netflix produced 10 episodes of The Fix in 2018, hosted by Carr. It was an attempt to export the UK panel show format to America, and, although still available on Netflix, no further episodes have been made.

Carr was the first British comedian to get a Netflix stand-up special, with his show Funny Business (March 2016).

During this festival, Carr slotted in one of his own tour gigs, at the Palace Theatre, and also performed at the Hollywood Palladium as a part of the line-up for Bill Burr Presents Friends Who Kill, which was filmed for another Netflix Special.

As a member of the Netflix comedy roster, he was also invited to a celebratory brunch at the home of Netflix co-CEO, Ted Sanderos.

The Comedy Store opened in Los Angeles in 1972 and has been a popular venue for stand-up comedians ever since. Carr has been performing there for many years and is one of a small number of British comedians that are listed as alumni and, in 2018, was given the honour of having his name painted on one of the club's walls.

Since 2015, Carr has made several appearances on the US live comedy show Kill Tony.

2024 once again saw Netflix host Netflix is a Joke Fest, in Los Angeles (2–12 May). Carr posted (on Twitter) that he had performed two gigs in the UK on 3 May and then performed at the Outside Joke event, at the Hollywood Palladium, Los Angeles, on 4 May.

On 5 May, Carr attended the Netflix special live stream of the Roast of Tom Brady.

Carr was one of the British comics supporting Amnesty International at the 2012 Secret Policeman's Ball in New York.

Before & Laughter, a memoir and self-help book authored by Carr, was published by Quercus in December 2021.

Viewing figures of the episode of his topical show 8 out of 10 Cats, recorded on the day of his apology and broadcast the following day, almost doubled compared with the previous week. Earlier in 2012, during the second series of Channel 4's satirical news programme 10 O'Clock Live, Carr had lampooned people who avoid paying their taxes. A sketch from the show, in which he poked fun at the 1% tax rate of Barclays and described tax lawyers as being "aggressive" and "amoral", was regarded as having "come back to haunt him".

In February 2018, Carr appeared on Room 101, where he talked about the controversy. Though he admitted that what he did was wrong, he said there was some level of hypocrisy in the comments that Cameron had made about him in 2012, stating that members of Cameron's family and Elizabeth II had subsequently been mentioned in the Panama Papers and Paradise Papers tax evasion scandals. Carr said that the law should become clearer by eliminating any , instead of leaving it up to individuals to decide what is morally right. Carr continues to reference the scandal in his performances and public appearances and takes Heckler on the subject with good humour, including responding to a heckle on the subject by saying: "There's two shows: One at 7, one at 9:30. One for me, one for them.

During the show, Carr defended his joke, saying that it had the educational value of raising awareness about groups who suffered genocide in the Holocaust. The joke later received widespread attention the following February after a clip was posted and shared online. He was condemned by the Auschwitz Memorial, Hope not Hate and The Traveller Movement, who called anti-Romani prejudice the "last acceptable form of racism" in the UK. He also faced criticism from British politicians, including Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Nadine Dorries, the culture secretary. The Holocaust Memorial Day Trust said they were "absolutely appalled" and "horrified", and they described Carr's joke as "abhorrent". Despite the criticism, Carr stood by the joke.