(Gervais said later that he had called Merchant for an interview simply because it was the first CV handed to him.) Merchant and Gervais hosted a Saturday afternoon radio show together from January through to August 1998, when both of them left XFM as it was bought by the Capital Radio Group. Merchant met Ricky Gervais for the first time in 1997, when Gervais (then in the position of "Head of Speech" at the London radio station XFM London) hired Merchant as his assistant. I realised that stand-up was not that easy after all." He also appeared as a contestant on a 1997 episode of the TV game show Blockbusters and worked for a short time as a DJ for Radio Caroline. Merchant began his career performing stand-up comedy at Bristol's Comedy Box, where, he recalls, "The first week I did really well. Recently, a number of tapes of The Steve Show have been rediscovered and are being distributed on various Merchant fan sites. Members of Merchant's "posse" included film critic James King, Dan Warren, Neil the Maskell, and Geraint the Welshman. It's only a matter of time before Steve and his posse follow in the footsteps of Newman and Baddiel." ―Radio Warwick Yearbook 1995/1996 This show stood out, as it was actually genuinely good. " The man behind the funniest show on W963, The Steve Show, highlights of which included an inspired take-off of the IRN news ("we spoke to Gerry Adams."), an advert for Coventry Library ("Coventry Library makes no claims to be infinite"), attempting to give away an Aerosmith video to people on the toilet in Rootes, telephoning the library bridge security post to ask if they had seen a lost ball, as well as a series of snippets entitled At Home with Rose and Fred West. Merchant had his first dramatic role in a film when he was cast as Caliban in the superhero film Logan (2017). His varied endeavors have earned him three BAFTA Awards, four British Comedy Awards and a Primetime Emmy Award. He starred in his first play, Richard Bean's The Mentalists, at London's Wyndham's Theatre from July to August 2015. He also voiced the computer program ConRad on The Simpsons in the 2016 episode "The Girl Code", co-developed the Sky1 travel series An Idiot Abroad (2010–2011) and performs as a stand-up comedian. Merchant appeared as himself in the BBC series Life's Too Short (2011–2013), which he co-wrote and co-directed. He is also known for his voice role as Wheatley in the 2011 video game Portal 2. Merchant is best known for his collaborations with Ricky Gervais and Karl Pilkington, as the co-writer and co-director of the popular British sitcom The Office (2001–2003), co-writer and co-star of Extras (2005–2007) and co-host of The Ricky Gervais Show in its radio, podcast, audiobook and television formats the radio version won a bronze Sony Award. In the original game, she wears a full orange jumpsuit in the sequel, she ties the top half of the jumpsuit around her waist, revealing the white top.Stephen James Merchant (born 24 November 1974) is an English writer, director, radio presenter, comedian, and actor. “Skateboard off their-I mean, you’ve seen YouTube.”Ĭorrection, May 9, 2011: This article originally stated that the protagonist of Portal and Portal 2 wears orange pants and a white sleeveless top. And yet: “People do all sorts of hard stuff,” Wolpaw went on to say. Humor can’t be play-tested, nor can it be focus-grouped. Why, then, don’t we see more good writing in video games-especially good comedic writing? Because, as Wolpaw conceded at NYU, it is hard. But it’s the nature of good writing, unlike good gameplay, to feel fresh and new when you encounter more of it. The writing in Portal 2 isn’t necessarily better than the first game, either. They’re fun little tricks, but the gameplay in the first Portal was so tight that these embellishments don’t feel like improvements. Most video-game sequels iterate on the controls and gameplay of the original, making tweaks and refinements that make the new game feel “the same, but better.” And sure enough, Portal 2 does contain some new gameplay twists: a trio of gels, in particular, that let your character leap higher, run faster, and expand the scope of where you can place each portal.
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