Rhod Gilbert

Personal life

Gilbert was born in Carmarthen, Wales, one of three siblings to two teacher parents, and studied languages at Exeter University. For the first three weeks, such was his painful shyness that Gilbert was unable to eat with other students in the canteen or even make friends with the student in the next room.

After graduating, Gilbert travelled for a year and a half around Australia and Asia before returning to Carmarthen and working as an admin assistant for the Welsh Office. Gilbert later worked as a qualitative researcher for several market research agencies in London.

Gilbert married his long-term girlfriend, writer and comedian Sian Harries, in August 2013. They split their time between London and Wales.

Stand-up comedy

Gilbert got into professional comedy in 2002, after taking part in the Amused Moose Stand Up and Deliver course, but only "thanks to a girlfriend’s constant nagging". Within 18 months, Gilbert had already won several different talent competitions and was nominated for the Perrier Newcomer award for his first solo show in 2005 at Edinburgh Fringe entitled 1984. He has since performed worldwide.

Many of Gilbert's stories are drawn from real life events, and his life in the wholly fictionalised village of Llanbobl. In 2008, Gilbert wrote a sitcom about life in Llanbobl, which featured on BBC Radio 2.

In his 2006 Edinburgh Fringe show Knocking on Heaven's Door, Gilbert told stories from his life, weighing up whether he would be admitted to heaven. His 2007 show, Who's Eaten Gilbert's Grape? saw Gilbert return to Llanbobl and pick up the story following the 1984 show narrative. His 2008 show, Rhod Gilbert and the Award-Winning Mince Pie, saw Gilbert question his sanity, his career and his life after suffering a mental breakdown brought on by the award-winning mince pie at a motorway services.

On 17 December 2008, he appeared at the 80th Royal Variety Performance.

On 18 and 19 June 2009, Gilbert made the last performances of Rhod Gilbert and the Award-Winning Mince Pie show at the Bloomsbury Theatre, which was recorded and released as a DVD on 16 November 2009. The DVD also contains several special features, including his infamous rant about lost luggage, outtakes from the performance and a mockumentary called Back To Llanbobl in which Gilbert shows the viewer around his fictional home town.

Gilbert's 2009/10 show, entitled Rhod Gilbert and the Cat That Looked Like Nicholas Lyndhurst, was announced on 5 April. The show previewed around the UK in small venues, before being performed at the Edinburgh Festival. The show toured UK theatres from September 2009. The tour included dates at many prestigious theatres such as London's HMV Hammersmith Apollo. A DVD of the tour was released on 15 November 2010.

Tours

Television

Gilbert has appeared three times on the BBC Two panel show Mock the Week, and guest presented two episodes of Never Mind the Buzzcocks in October 2009 and December 2011 before becoming the permanent presenter for the final series. Also, he guest hosted an episode of Have I Got News for You in April 2011. Gilbert has also appeared as a guest on Channel 4's 8 out of 10 Cats, and has used his comedy talents to write and narrate BBC Three's 2007 Goals Galore, Pranks Galore, Football Gaffes Galore and TV Gaffes Galore programmes. He has also presented BBC 2W's Rhod Gilbert's Teen Tribes, providing an insight into the teen tribal worlds of "Emos", "Chavs" and "Goths".

Gilbert was Paramount Comedy's continuity writer and announcer between September 2004 and October 2005, providing end-credit voice-overs for their peaktime programme schedule.

In December 2008, Gilbert was signed for an advertising campaign to further promote tourism in Wales and became the official Voice of Wales for the country's tourist-board, fronting the 2009 Visit Wales television advertising.

Gilbert has done reports for the BBC One current affairs/human interest show The One Show.

In November 2008, Gilbert appeared on the BBC's Live at the Apollo as a guest. In December 2009, he hosted the show, introducing fellow comedian John Bishop. On 6 June 2009 Gilbert appeared as the headline act on Michael McIntyre's Comedy Roadshow on BBC One, and he guested on 8 out of 10 Cats on 17 July 2009. He also provided voiceover material for the sketch show Walk on the Wild Side.

On 19 January 2010, Rhod Gilbert's Work Experience aired on BBC One Wales. Zipline Creative Limited worked freelance as producer/directors, editors and also camera and sound on the series for Presentable RDF. The four-part series saw Gilbert attempt a number of jobs including hairdresser, refuse collector, soldier and parent. Following the show's success on BBC One Wales, the series aired nationally on BBC2 from 10 March.

In August 2010, the BBC commissioned eight episodes of Ask Rhod Gilbert following a successful pilot earlier in 2010. The show featured Gilbert, Greg Davies and Lloyd Langford answering random trivia questions, such as 'Who would win in a race, Usain Bolt or a grizzly bear?', posed by the public and celebrities, with additional celebrity guests on the panel. The show ran for two series.

On 7 March 2011, series 2 of Rhod Gilbert's Work Experience began airing on BBC One Wales. In this series Gilbert tried out jobs as a farmer, butler, tattoo artist and firefighter. In January 2012, Gilbert began filming series 3 of the show. It aired on BBC One Wales from 7 May 2012 and saw him take on jobs such as primary school teacher, zookeeper, drag artist and police officer. A fourth series was broadcast in June–July 2013. This series, the jobs were wedding planner, scout leader, tour guide and male model. Gilbert has been asked to return for a fifth series, and the new series was confirmed in March 2014. Series 5, which includes four episodes, began broadcast on BBC One Wales in September 2014 and was repeated on BBC Two from February 2015. Series 6 was broadcast on BBC One Wales starting February 2016.

The documentary Rhod Gilbert vs Kilimanjaro, chronicling the attempt to climb Mount Kilimanjaro for charity made by Gilbert and several fellow celebrities, was shown on the BBC in December 2014.

Gilbert appeared several times on the Channel 4 comedy/game show 8 Out of 10 Cats Does Countdown.

He replaced comedian Jack Dee as the host of The Apprentice: You're Fired! beginning in 2016.

Radio

In 2006, Gilbert hosted the BBC Radio Wales comedy panel show Jest a Minute, live from The Comedy Store in London. The second series of Jest a Minute was recorded in late 2008 in Cardiff's Glee Club, hosted by Gilbert and featuring regular team captains Chris Corcoran and Lloyd Langford, and guests from the comedy circuit such as Elis James, Greg Davies, Lucy Porter and Jon Richardson. A third series was also broadcast.

Gilbert was also the host of BBC Radio 4's 4 Stands Up comedy series which aired in the Autumn of 2008 and has also appeared twice on Radio Four's Just a Minute, Radio 2's Does the Team Think?, and BBC Radio 4's Act Your Age.

In December 2008, a pilot of his sitcom Rhod Gilbert's Leaving Llanbobl was broadcast on BBC Radio Two; the sitcom was written and starred Gilbert and Greg Davies, with additional writing by Sian Harries. Lloyd Langford played Gilbert's amiable younger brother Emrys, Di Botcher played Brenda, a gossipy hairdresser, and Mike Hayward played Gilbert's father Gurnos. The show was produced by Ed Morrish. He has hinted in interviews that the sitcom is likely to move to TV when it is completed as he found that he was "seeing it" as he wrote it.

Gilbert has also made several appearances on the BBC Radio 4 comedy program The Unbelievable Truth.

In 2011, Gilbert recorded a radio show for BBC Radio 2 called Rhod Gilbert's Bulging Barrel of Laughs with comedians Lloyd Langford, Greg Davies and Sarah Millican. Each show also featured live music from bands such as Athlete, Scouting for Girls, Kid British and The Hoosiers. It has since been repeated on BBC Radio 4 Extra.

Gilbert also fronts his own radio show, The Rhod Gilbert Radio Show, broadcast by BBC Radio Wales on Saturdays between 11am and 1pm, often co-hosted by Lloyd Langford or fellow Welsh stand-up comedian Chris Corcoran.

Awards