Craig Joseph Charles was born on 11 July 1964 and is an English actor, comedian, television and radio presenter.
82 Facts About Craig Charles
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Craig Charles is best known for his roles as Dave Lister in the science fiction sitcom Red Dwarf and Lloyd Mullaney in the soap opera Coronation Street.
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Craig Charles presented the gladiator-style game show Robot Wars from 1998 to 2004, and narrated the comedy endurance show Takeshi's Castle.
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From 2017 to 2022, Craig Charles hosted The Gadget Show for Channel 5.
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Craig Charles's acting credits include playing inmate Eugene Buffy in the ITV drama The Governor, and leading roles in the British films Fated and Clubbing to Death.
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Craig Charles has toured the UK extensively as a stand-up comedian.
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Craig Joseph Charles was born in Liverpool on 11 July 1964, the son of a Guyanese father and Irish mother.
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Craig Charles grew up on the Cantril Farm housing estate with his older brother, Dean, and two other brothers, Jimmy and Emile.
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Craig Charles won a national competition run by The Guardian newspaper for a poem he wrote when he was 12 years old.
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Craig Charles began his career as a contemporary and urban performance poet on the British cabaret circuit.
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Craig Charles's performances were considered original, with Charles described as having a natural ironic wit which appealed to talent scouts.
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In 1981, Craig Charles climbed on stage at a Teardrop Explodes concert and recited a humorous, but derogatory, poem about the band's singer, Julian Cope.
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Craig Charles was invited to open subsequent gigs for the group and went on to perform as a support act in pubs and clubs for the following three years, and at events such as the Larks in the Park music festival at Sefton Park.
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Craig Charles was involved in the Liverpool music scene, writing and singing lyrics for a number of local rock bands.
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Craig Charles performed his political rap lyrics as a 'Wordsmith'.
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In 1983, Craig Charles was invited to record a session on the John Peel BBC Radio show, performing his poems backed by a band.
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Craig Charles realised he was using poetry as a vehicle for his sense of humour and progressed into stand-up comedy.
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Craig Charles was part of the Red Wedge comedy tour in 1986, which aimed to raise awareness of the social problems of the time, in support of the Labour Party.
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Craig Charles performed his first one-man show in 1986, which premiered in Edinburgh, and then toured internationally.
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Craig Charles was a guest on programmes including Janice Long's Radio 1 show, and he was a regular panellist on Ned Sherrin's chat show Loose Ends on BBC Radio 4.
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Craig Charles first appeared on television as the resident poet on the arts programme Riverside on BBC2 and on the day-time BBC1 chat show Pebble Mill at One.
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Craig Charles was the resident poet on the Channel 4 programme Black on Black and its entertainment-based successor Club Mix, and he appeared, weekly, as a John Cooper Clarke-style 'punk poet' on the BBC2 pop music programme Oxford Road Show.
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Craig Charles performed his political poems as stand-up comedy on the late-night show Saturday Live and on the prime-time BBC1 chat show Wogan, where he performed a topical poem in a weekly feature.
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Craig Charles appeared as a guest on shows including Open Air.
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Craig Charles included significant acting in his performance style, enabling him to put the emotion across.
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In September 2015, Craig Charles performed his "epic" poem Scary Fairy and the Tales of the Dark Wood live with the BBC Philharmonic orchestra, in a concert to be broadcast on BBC Radio 2's Friday Night is Music Night at Halloween.
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Craig Charles was introduced to the show by Saturday Live and Red Dwarf producer Paul Jackson, who wanted his opinion on whether the black character Cat was a racist stereotype.
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Craig Charles has appeared in all twelve series as well as Red Dwarf: The Promised Land.
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The role has involved Craig Charles playing a variety of alternative characters, including a gangster, a cowboy and angelic and evil versions of Lister, and in him carrying out a wide range of stunts, and acting involving special effects.
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Craig Charles reads the audiobook editions of both the Red Dwarf novel Last Human and his book The Log: A Dwarfer's Guide to Everything, and he regularly attends sci-fi, comedy and memorabilia conventions in connection with the Red Dwarf franchise.
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Craig Charles presented Robot Wars on BBC2 and Channel 5, from series 2 until series 7, which included two Extreme series and numerous 'specials'.
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Craig Charles was the main host and presided over the arena in which teams of amateur engineers battled their home-made radio-controlled robots against each other, and against the house robots.
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Craig Charles introduced the show, enthusiastically announced the results of the battles and spoke to the contestants after the main events.
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Craig Charles ended each episode with a short Robot Wars-themed poem.
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Craig Charles' son, Jack, appeared on the show on several occasions, and was a contestant on "Team Nemesis" during series 4.
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Craig Charles hosted the Robot Wars Live UK tour, in 2001 and shows performed at the Wembley Arena.
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Craig Charles stated his interest in hosting it again, but the job went to Dara O Briain and Angela Scanlon.
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Craig Charles provided the English voice-over commentary for the Challenge rebroadcast of the popular game show Takeshi's Castle, originally by Tokyo Broadcasting System in Japan.
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Craig Charles co-wrote the programme and commentated throughout all 122 episodes of the four series, and some special and "best of" episodes.
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Craig Charles provided comedy insights into the contestants' abilities, which were designed to appeal to adult audiences, as well as younger viewers - and coined the term "Keshi Heads" to describe fans of the show.
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In 2005, Craig Charles joined the main cast of Coronation Street, playing a philandering taxicab driver, Lloyd Mullaney.
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Craig Charles introduced aspects of the character himself, making Lloyd a Northern Soul DJ and record collector, and funk music enthusiast.
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Craig Charles portrayed Lloyd as tough, but kind hearted and romantic, and the character was popular with viewers.
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Craig Charles added a comedy element to the role, but was involved in traumatic and emotional scenes with intricate storylines.
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Craig Charles presented documentaries for the show, including 50 Years of Corrie Stunts, which is included on the Tram Crash DVD.
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In November 2011, Craig Charles took time off from Coronation Street to film a new series of Red Dwarf, returning in April 2012.
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In May 2015, Craig Charles announced he would be leaving Coronation Street for Red Dwarf, BBC Radio 2, and BBC Radio 6 Music.
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Craig Charles has acted in episodes of popular dramas such as The Bill, EastEnders and Holby City and in the comedy The 10 Percenters.
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Craig Charles played the emotionally disturbed and violent prisoner, Eugene Buffy, in the highly successful Lynda La Plante drama series The Governor ; the title role in the Channel 4 pirate sitcom Captain Butler ; the warden of a women's prison in the Canadian sci-fi fantasy Lexx ; Detective Chief Inspector Mercer in seven episodes of the BBC soap opera Doctors ; and soccer agent, Joel Brooks, in the Sky TV football soap Dream Team.
50.
Craig Charles presented the virtual reality game show Cyberzone on BBC2; the late-night entertainment show Funky Bunker on ITV; the reality show Jailbreak on Channel 5; the discussion show Amazing Space: The Pub Guide to the Universe on National Geographic; and the late-night current affairs chat show Weapons of Mass Distraction on ITV.
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Craig Charles has appeared on celebrity editions of University Challenge, Can't Cook, Won't Cook, The Weakest Link, The Chase and Pointless, and comedy panel shows such as Have I Got News for You, Just a Minute and They Think It's All Over and Keith Lemon's Through the Keyhole.
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Craig Charles was a team captain on the sci-fi quiz series Space Cadets on Channel 4, which guest starred William Shatner.
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Craig Charles has opened the National Lottery draw and his home has featured on Through the Keyhole.
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Craig Charles was a contestant in the Celebrity Poker Club tournament on Challenge, where he reached the semi-finals, and in the Channel 4 reality game show, The Games, which documented the contestants' intensive training regime and each live Olympic Games-style sporting event.
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From 16 November 2014, Craig Charles took part in the fourteenth series of I'm a Celebrity.
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In 1995, Craig Charles played the Porter in Steven Berkoff's adaptation of Shakespeare's Macbeth, on Radio 4.
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Craig Charles explains the context for the music and carries out interviews with guest musicians.
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Craig Charles regularly sits in for various presenters, and has presented numerous programmes on the station, including The Craig Charles Soul All-Nighter, which he hosted continuously for 12 hours, and the Beatleland documentary on The Beatles.
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Craig Charles has chosen music as a guest of other broadcasters such as Ken Bruce on Radio 2 and Liz Kershaw on 6 Music.
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Craig Charles covered for Graham Norton on Radio 2's Saturday mid-morning show during Norton's 10-week 2015 summer break.
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Since 18 October 2021, Craig Charles has hosted the weekday afternoon show on BBC Radio 6 Music.
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Craig Charles has been involved in the music industry through much of his career.
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Craig Charles's bands have included Watt 4, in which he played keyboards and sang, Craig Charles and the Beat Burglars, The Sons of Gordon Gekko, where he wrote lyrics and composed tunes and The Eye, with whom he recorded the rock album "Giving You The Eye, Live at the Edinburgh Festival".
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In 1987, Craig Charles provided the poem track used for the opening credits of the BBC series The Marksman, which is included on the album "The Marksman: Music from the BBC TV series".
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Craig Charles wrote lyrics for Suzanne Rhatigan's album To Hell With Love.
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In 1993, Craig Charles was signed to the Acid Jazz record label.
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In 2009, Craig Charles formed the Fantasy Funk Band from the leading British musicians in the genre, and has presented the band at festivals, including Glastonbury and the BBC's Proms in the Park.
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Craig Charles followed these with a Craig Charles Funk and Soul Classics album of three CDs in 2015.
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Craig Charles played Eddie in the 1987 political drama Business as Usual.
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In 2006, Craig Charles starred in two British feature films: the fantasy film Fated and the gangster film Clubbing to Death.
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Craig Charles voiced Zipper the Cat in the animation Prince Cinders and Asterix in Asterix Conquers America.
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In 1998, Craig Charles published No Other Blue, a collection of his poetry, with illustrations by Philippa Drakeford, on diverse personal subjects including prison, his mother's final illness, love and politics at home and abroad.
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In 2000, Craig Charles wrote his first autobiography about his experiences growing up in Liverpool, titled No Irish, No Niggers.
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In 2007, he announced he would release his autobiography, planned for March 2008, published by Hodder Headline and titled On the Rocks, which would cover the recent incidents in his life and be based on much of his journal, which Craig Charles said he kept while in rehab.
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Craig Charles has been involved in journalism and has had a column in Time Out magazine.
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In 2005 and 2006, Craig Charles was a monthly columnist for the Liverpool Echo newspaper.
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Craig Charles's television writing credits include The Easter Stories, Funky Bunker and Takeshi's Castle.
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Craig Charles is involved in music journalism as he wrote liner notes for the funk and soul music producer Mr Confuse for his albums Feel The Fire, Do You Realize and Only A Man regarding his work as a music presenter for The Craig Charles Funk and Soul Show on BBC Radio 6 Music.
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Craig Charles has three children: a son named Jack from his first marriage to actress Cathy Tyson, and two daughters named Anna-Jo and Nellie from his second marriage to Jackie Fleming.
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Craig Charles was remanded in custody for three and a half months before being granted bail, during which time he was assaulted by a man wielding a makeshift knife.
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In June 2006, newspaper allegations of crack cocaine use resulted in Craig Charles being suspended from both Coronation Street and BBC Radio 6 Music.
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Craig Charles returned to hosting his 6 Music show from November 2006 and filming Coronation Street from January 2007.