A catchphrase (or catch-phrase) is a phrase or expression recognized by its repeated utterance. Such phrases often originate in popular culture and in the arts, and typically spread through a variety of mass media (such as literature and publishing, motion pictures, television and radio), as well as word of mouth. Some catchphrases become the de facto "trademark" of the person or character with whom they originated, and can be instrumental in the typecasting (beneficially or otherwise) of that actor.

Society

According to Richard Harris, a psychology professor at Kansas State University who studied why people like to cite films in social situations, using film quotes in everyday conversation is similar to telling a joke and a way to form solidarity with others. "People are doing it to feel good about themselves, to make others laugh, to make themselves laugh", he said. He found that all of the participants in his study had used film quotes in conversation at one point or another. "They overwhelmingly cited comedies, followed distantly by dramas and action adventure flicks." Horror films, musicals and children's films were hardly ever cited.

See also

''Catchphrase'' (UK game show)

Cliché

List of political catch phrases

Meme

Set phrase

Slogan

Snowclone

References

Further reading

Partridge, Eric (1894-1979) ed. Beale. ''A Dictionary of Catch Phrases, American and British, from the sixteenth century to the present day'' (enlarged trade paperback edition) Lanham, Maryland: Scarborough House, 1992. ISBN 0-8128-8536-8. E-book ISBN 0-203-37995-0

Category:Anthropology

es:Latiguillo fr:Phrase fétiche hi:सूत्रवाक्य nl:Catchphrase pt:Bordão sv:Catch phrase ta:பிடி வரி th:สำนวนติดปาก vi:Câu cửa miệng

name	Roy Walker
birth name	Robert Walker
birth date	July 31, 1940
birth place	Belfast, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom
medium	Broadcaster, comedian
nationality	Northern Irish
active	1977–present
genre	Stand-up
spouse	Jean Walker (?–1989)(her death); 3 children
notable work	''Catchphrase''''The Comedians''
website	www.roywalker.co.uk }}

Robert "Roy" Walker (born 31 July 1940) is a television personality and comedian from Northern Ireland, who worked for many years as both a television presenter and comedy actor. He is best known as the original host of the game show ''Catchphrase'' between 1986 and 1999, and one of the stars of ''The Comedians''.

Early life

Born in Belfast, as a teenager Walker performed in the Francis Longford Choir, then worked as a riveter in the Harland and Wolff shipyard. He was the Northern Ireland champion hammer thrower for two years, and represented his country internationally. He spent a short time as a comedy partner of James Young before spending seven years in the British Army.

Walker, who first went to work at the age of twelve, "to bring a few extra pennies into the house", ran a fruit shop whilst working in the evenings as the compère at the Talk of the Town club during the Troubles in Northern Ireland. One day he was confronted by two men who stuck a Browning pistol in his face and demanded to know: "Are you married to a Fenian?" Walker later recalled, "Protestants and Catholics drank together in the Talk of the Town – integration happened in front of my eyes every night. As a Protestant myself, I had lots of Catholic friends – the Army had been full of them. Bob Hope said you should never admit to anything and that day I didn't. But then I was told: 'We're giving everyone 24 hours – that's you and them Fenian lovers across the street.' I got one of the cards I'd used for the apple prices and on the back I wrote: 'The owner of this shop served Queen and country for six years'. I stuck it in the window, closed up and walked down the Woodstock Road for the last time."

The shop was then firebombed and Walker fled with his family to England where he toured as a professional comedian, in working men's clubs and cabaret.

Career

Walker came to fame in 1977 when he won the ITV talent show ''New Faces'', receiving the highest mark ever given to a comedian. He was also a regular on the 1970s ITV stand-up comedy show ''The Comedians''. He appeared on the BBC show ''Seaside Special'' on 15 July 1978. Also in 1978 he appeared in two episodes of ''Blackpool Bonanza''. In 1984 he appeared in an episode of the comedy series ''The Main Attraction''. Walker is most famous for the game show ''Catchphrase'', which he co-hosted with his computer character friend that he created, Mr Chips, from 1986 to 1999. Walker coined his own catchphrases for the show: "Say what you see", and "It's good, but it's not right". On 12 June 1994, he appeared on ''Surprise, Surprise''. Other television appearances in the 1990s included ''You Bet!'', ''Gagtat'', ''Light Lunch'', ''Wipeout'' (celebrity special) and ''TV Nightmares''.

Walker appeared as himself in the first episode of ''Phoenix Nights'' on 14 January 2001. In 2002, he took part in the comedy game show ''"It's Only TV... But I Like It"'' and also appeared on ''Harry Hill's TV Burp''.

In 2004, he appeared in the third series of the reality television series ''I'm Famous and Frightened!'' on Living. In 2005, Walker appeared as Monsignor in the romantic drama film ''The Jealous God'', which was released on 9 September. On 4 March 2006, he was the Northern Ireland Regional Presenter in the UK's ''Eurovision Song Contest'' selection show ''Making Your Mind Up''. On 12 August 2006, he appeared in an episode entitled ''The Comics'' of the documentary ''The Story of Light Entertainment''. And on 14 October, he appeared on ''Ant & Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway''. He appeared on The Paul O'Grady Show in 2006 with Frank Carson as mystery guests, they were in disguise in the audience.

On 19 February 2007, he was a guest on the Irish chat show, ''The Podge and Rodge Show'' on RTÉ. And on 30 November, he was a guest on the day time chat show ''Loose Women''.

In 2008, Walker was a guest on ''The Alan Titchmarsh Show''. He presented a six-part comedy series for BBC Radio Ulster, ''The Way We Tell 'Em'', as well as appearing on ''Ready Steady Cook'' on 5 June 2008. On 10 June, Walker appeared on ''Big Brother's Big Mouth'' as a secret special guest. Walker is a noted after dinner speaker and in June 2008 spoke and presented awards at the AIS Presidents Launch at the Dorchester Hotel in London. In 2008, he performed at the Edinburgh Comedy Festival in his own one hour show entitled ''Goodbye Mr Chips'' debuting on 31 July, his 68th birthday. He was also team captain on the first series of the BBC Radio 4 panel game ''Act Your Age''.

Walker has appeared (in pre-recorded audiobite form) on ''The Chris Moyles Show'' on BBC Radio 1, in features called "Car Park Catchphrase" and "Beep Beep Busters", a spoof of the game show ''Catchphrase''.

Walker starred in the Churchill Insurance adverts, alongside model Megan Hall, seen at an Indian restaurant with the Churchill Dog in 2009. On 26 May 2009, he appeared on the ''Britain's Got Talent'' show ''Britain's Got More Talent''. Also in 2009, he appeared in a celebrity edition of the reality cookery show ''Come Dine With Me'', which aired on 1 November - in which he came first. The other contestants were ''Most Haunted'' presenter Yvette Fielding, Natasha Hamilton of pop group Atomic Kitten, and former ''Coronation Street'' actor Bruce Jones.

Personal life

Walker lives in Lytham St Annes, Lancashire. He has three children with his wife Jean, who died of cancer in 1989.

Cultural references

A track on Belle & Sebastian's 2003 album ''Dear Catastrophe Waitress'' is named after Walker.

References

External links

Official website

Category:1940 births Category:British game show hosts Category:British television presenters Category:Living people Category:Comedians from Northern Ireland Category:People from Belfast Category:Edinburgh Comedy Festival Category:People from Lytham St Annes

birthname	Simon Marc Amstell
birth date	November 29, 1979
birth place	Gants Hill, London, England
occupation	Stand-up comedianTelevision presenterScript writer, actor
years active	1993–present
website	}}

Simon Marc Amstell (born 29 November 1979, Gants Hill, northeast London) is a BAFTA nominated, award-winning English comedian, television presenter, screenwriter and actor, best known for his roles as former co-host of ''Popworld'', as the host of ''Never Mind the Buzzcocks'' and now as the co-writer and star of the award-winning situation comedy ''Grandma's House''.

Early life

Amstell was born in east London in 1979 and was raised in Gants Hill, London in a Jewish family. His first television appearance was in 1993 when he appeared as a contestant on the Channel 4 game show ''GamesMaster''. He also appeared on ''Good Morning with Anne and Nick'' doing an impression of Dame Edna Everage, and in a 1994 episode of ''Family Catchphrase''. In the latter, he described himself as a budding magician and showed one of his tricks to the presenter, Andrew O'Connor, who was himself a magician. Amstell and his family won a television and a video recorder.

Amstell started performing on the comedy circuit when he was in his early teens and later became the youngest finalist of the BBC New Comedy Awards. His first professional television appearance was in 1998 as a presenter on the UK children's channel Nickelodeon. He claims he was sacked for being "sarcastic and mean to children" although the potted biography on his website also, jokingly, claims:

"He started his TV career at Nickoledeon where he was fired for making pop stars uncomfortable. He then began presenting the Channel 4 show, ''Popworld'' – where he gained a huge following for his groundbreaking work in making pop stars uncomfortable."

The culture in which he was raised (Judaism) and his sexuality (he is openly gay) figure occasionally in his work.

''Popworld''

From 2000 to 2006 he presented ''Popworld'' on Channel 4 with Miquita Oliver. He voiced the characters "Timothy the Popworld melon" and "Richard the Popworld horse". On ''Popworld'' he developed a highly ironic, surreal and left field style which gained the show a cult following, but angered many of its guests. One such example was a mock interview with singer Lemar called "Lemar From Afar" in which Amstell shouted questions into a megaphone from one end of the world's largest car park while Lemar stood at the other end. Another was a "Si-chiatrist" interview with Luke Pritchard and Hugh Harris of The Kooks in which Amstell played the role of psychiatrist and Pritchard and Harris his patients. This section was dropped when Pritchard revealed after the interview that he had recently been diagnosed with mental health problems, and thought Simon was a real psychiatrist. During his time at Popworld, Amstell was at the centre of several controversies, including making Britney Spears cry after asking her if she thought she'd "gone a bit nuts".

''Never Mind the Buzzcocks''

Amstell first appeared on the comedy pop quiz show ''Never Mind the Buzzcocks'' as a guest during Mark Lamarr's tenure as host, in 2003 and 2005. Following Lamarr's departure, he was one of the series's guest hosts, before being appointed as permanent host beginning in October 2006. He said at the time that he hoped to beat "the universal, exceptionless rule that when a new host takes over an old show it is a horrible, embarrassing disaster".

In June 2007, Amstell and long-term collaborator Dan Swimer wrote ''Imagine... A Mildly Amusing Panel Show'', a spoof version of Alan Yentob's arts programme ''Imagine''. Yentob and Amstell play themselves in a mock interview between what a number of noted commentators described as 'overtly sexual' clips of Amstell's episodes of ''Never Mind the Buzzcocks''. It was followed in February 2008 by ''Never Mind the Buzzcocks: A Moving Tribute'', which jokingly implied that Amstell had either died or retired from the show.

On 25 April 2009, Amstell announced via his internet mailing list that he would not be hosting another series of ''Never Mind the Buzzcocks'' because of his desire to instead concentrate on his live tours and stand-up performances.

Amstell won several awards for his work on ''Never Mind the Buzzcocks''. In March 2007, he won the 2006 Royal Television Society Award for ''Best Entertainment Performance''. In December 2007, he won two British Comedy Awards for Best Comedy Entertainment Personality and Best Comedy Entertainment Series for ''Never Mind the Buzzcocks''. In addition, ''Never Mind the Buzzcocks'' won the Best Entertainment Programme award at the Broadcast Awards 2008. Amstell's era was the reason why Never Mind the Buzzcocks was chosen as the 36th best TV show of the decade by The Times.

Writing and acting

Amstell co-wrote an episode of Channel 4 teen drama ''Skins'' in 2007, entitled "Maxxie and Anwar".

In 2009 BBC2 commissioned a six-part series entitled ''Grandma's House'' from Tiger Aspect Productions, written by and starring Amstell, co-written by Dan Swimer. The show was commissioned after the airing of a pilot earlier the same year. Filming started in February 2010 and broadcast began in August 2010.

Stand-up

Amstell also performs as a stand up comedian. He has performed at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe every August 2005–2007 and 2009. He has also appeared at the Carling Festivals in the Cabaret and Comedy tent for the last two years. In 2008, Amstell completed his first UK tour. He appeared at the Just for Laughs Comedy Festival in Montreal in July 2009. His entire run at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2009 at the Bongo Club sold out. He took part in his second national tour in the autumn of 2009.

Amstell performed a stand up at Heysham High School in Morecambe, Lancashire on Tuesday 29 September 2009. He commented that this was a 'warm-up' prior to the gig he had at Morecambe Library later in the day.

Amstell performed 'Do Nothing' in 2009 at the Royal Court Theatre, raising money for their young writers programme.

In May 2010, Amstell recorded 'Do Nothing' in Dublin's Vicar Street venue for a November DVD release.

References

External links

Simon Amstell at KBJ Management

Simon Amstell on Chortle

Category:1979 births Category:Living people Category:People from Gants Hill Category:Gay writers Category:Jewish writers Category:Comedians from London Category:English television presenters Category:English Jews Category:Jewish comedians Category:LGBT comedians Category:LGBT people from England Category:LGBT television personalities Category:LGBT Jews Category:Never Mind the Buzzcocks

cy:Simon Amstell da:Simon Amstell de:Simon Amstell nl:Simon Amstell sv:Simon Amstell