Peter Kay - Biography

Rate: Peter Kay left school with a grand total of 1 GCSE in the subject of Art. After that - what with his limited career choices - he took several jobs like working in his local discount supermarket, a bingo hall and, best of all, in a toilet roll factory.

He started doing his own stand-up shows at plenty of working men's clubs in the North-West. Now, you can only begin to imagine the type of people who used to make up his audience. And this is where he gathered a lot of his inspiration for his subsequent television shows on Channel 4.

In 1997 Channel 4 ran a competition to find new comedy talent called 'So You Think You're Funny?' which he won, leading him to the Edinburgh Festival. After a successful run there his show was nominated for the Perrier Award. Aside from being a posh brand of bottled water, we think this is a good award, too.

One his big breaks was when he wrote and starred in a spoof documentary called The Services. He developed it into his own series called That Peter Kay Thing where he played the role of non-less than fifteen different characters.

Peter scored a number one single when he teamed up with Tony Christie to re-record the hit Is This The Way To Amarillo?

In October 2008 Channel 4 broadcast Peter's latest show, a spoof of reality television. Called 'Britain's Got The Pop Factor And Possibly A New Celebrity Jesus Christ Soapstar Superstar Strictly On Ice' (try saying that with a mouthful of kebab), the show spawned a hit single from winner Geraldine McQueen. In 'reality', it was yet another of Peter's brilliant characters.

Peter's autobiography was a massive hit when it was published, selling 600,000 copies in the first two months.