Hugh Laurie Biography Quotes 17 Report mistakes

Early Life and Family
James Hugh Calum Laurie was born on 11 June 1959 in Oxford, England, United Kingdom. Known professionally as Hugh Laurie, he grew up in a household steeped in achievement and public service. His father, William George Ranald Mundell Laurie, known as Ran Laurie, was a physician and an Olympic gold medalist in rowing. His mother, Patricia Laurie, encouraged discipline and learning, and the family valued education and persistence. Laurie attended the Dragon School in Oxford and later Eton College, where his mix of academic promise and athletic intensity began to take shape.

Education and Rowing
Laurie continued to Selwyn College, Cambridge, studying archaeology and anthropology. Following his father, he rowed at a high level and trained with the ambition to reach international standards. An extended bout of glandular fever ended those aspirations and changed his life. Redirected from the river to the stage, he joined the Cambridge Footlights, the university comedy club that has produced many of Britain's leading comic talents. He quickly formed enduring creative partnerships, notably with Stephen Fry and Emma Thompson. As Footlights president in 1981, he helped lead The Cellar Tapes to the Perrier Award at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, a springboard that introduced Laurie, Fry, and Thompson to a national audience.

Breakthrough in British Comedy
Laurie and Stephen Fry developed a celebrated double act that combined precise wordplay, musical interludes, and sketch comedy. Their BBC series A Bit of Fry & Laurie showcased their writing and performing chemistry across multiple seasons, establishing Laurie as a distinctive comic voice and gifted pianist. In parallel, Laurie became a key player in Rowan Atkinson's Blackadder universe, created by Richard Curtis and Ben Elton. Across different series, he played foppish and guileless aristocrats and the brave, naive Lieutenant George, roles that demonstrated the elasticity of his comic persona while anchoring him in a classic ensemble that included Atkinson, Tony Robinson, Tim McInnerny, and Miranda Richardson.

Jeeves and Wooster and the Wodehouse Connection
Laurie's portrayal of Bertie Wooster opposite Stephen Fry's Jeeves in the early 1990s brought P. G. Wodehouse's characters to a new generation. The series required musicality, exact timing, and an airy lightness, all of which Laurie supplied while performing at the piano and singing. The show deepened the cultural bond between Laurie and Fry and cemented Laurie's reputation as a master of high-comic style.

Film and Television Through the 1990s
Beyond sketch comedy, Laurie found steady work in film and television drama and comedy. He appeared in Peter's Friends alongside Emma Thompson and Kenneth Branagh, had a scene-stealing turn as Mr. Palmer in Ang Lee's Sense and Sensibility (with a screenplay by Thompson), played a hapless henchman opposite Glenn Close in 101 Dalmatians, and became familiar to family audiences as the gentle, slightly bewildered Mr. Little in Stuart Little with Geena Davis and the voice of Michael J. Fox as Stuart. These roles highlighted his range: deadpan wit, restrained pathos, and nimble physicality. He also wrote for television, continuing the collaboration with Fry that had begun at Cambridge.

House and International Stardom
Laurie's global breakthrough came with House (2004, 2012), created by David Shore, with early executive producers including Paul Attanasio and Katie Jacobs and a pilot directed by Bryan Singer. As Dr. Gregory House, Laurie sustained a fiercely intelligent, abrasive, and morally complicated character for eight seasons. His American accent surprised many and was widely praised by colleagues and audiences in the United States. The role earned him multiple Emmy nominations, two Golden Globes, and Screen Actors Guild honors, and for much of the run he was among television's highest-paid actors. Filmed in Los Angeles, the series required long periods away from his family in the United Kingdom, a sacrifice he acknowledged publicly. The work also drew on his musicality; his piano and guitar occasionally surfaced onscreen, reflecting a real-life passion.

Dramatic Range After House
Post-House, Laurie deepened his dramatic catalog. He played the chilling arms dealer Richard Onslow Roper in The Night Manager, the John le Carre adaptation directed by Susanne Bier and co-starring Tom Hiddleston and Olivia Colman, a role that won him a Golden Globe. He brought wry authority to Armando Iannucci's satire Veep as Senator Tom James. He led the Hulu drama Chance, based on Kem Nunn's novel, and reunited with Iannucci for Avenue 5. In film, he appeared in Tomorrowland with George Clooney and, later, in The Personal History of David Copperfield as Mr. Dick, part of another Iannucci ensemble that included Dev Patel and Tilda Swinton.

Music and Touring
Parallel to screen work, Laurie pursued a serious engagement with American blues. He released Let Them Talk (2011) and Didnt It Rain (2013), albums that paid homage to New Orleans and delta traditions and featured collaborations with artists such as Tom Jones, Irma Thomas, and Dr. John. Touring with the Copper Bottom Band, he performed as singer and pianist, drawing on a lifelong command of the keyboard and a love for the idiom that predated his fame in drama. Critics noted the sincerity of his approach and the depth of his repertoire, an extension of the musical sensibility that ran through his comedy days with Fry.

Writing and Direction
Laurie authored the bestselling thriller The Gun Seller, blending deadpan humor with espionage tropes, and has long been associated with sharp, literate writing for television through A Bit of Fry & Laurie and other projects. He later adapted and directed a miniseries of Agatha Christies Why Didnt They Ask Evans?, in which he also appeared, guiding performances from a cast that included Will Poulter and Lucy Boynton. The project underlined his widening role behind the camera and his affection for classic British storytelling.

Honors and Public Persona
Laurie was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 2007 and later a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 2018 for services to drama. In 2016 he received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, a marker of his transatlantic impact. He has spoken candidly about clinical depression and the pressures of sustained television work, adding a note of vulnerability to a public image often associated with quick wit, reserve, and technical polish. Offscreen, he is known for his love of motorcycles and for playing multiple instruments, including piano, guitar, harmonica, and drums.

Personal Life
Laurie married theater administrator Jo Green in 1989. They have three children, Charles, William, and Rebecca. The family's home base remained in the United Kingdom during the House years, and Laurie has often credited Green's support for enabling the transatlantic demands of his career. His lifelong friendship and creative partnership with Stephen Fry remains a defining thread, rooted in the camaraderie of Footlights and sustained across decades of stage, television, and charity endeavors, including frequent contributions to Comic Relief alongside colleagues such as Rowan Atkinson and Emma Thompson.

Legacy and Influence
Hugh Laurie's career charts a rare arc: national comic mainstay, international dramatic star, working musician, and accomplished author. He helped set a standard for literate sketch comedy with Fry, gave definitive screen life to Wodehouse's Bertie Wooster, embodied the tragicomic courage of Lieutenant George in Blackadder, and created one of television's indelible antiheroes in Dr. House. His work has been shaped and enriched by collaborators and friends, Stephen Fry, Emma Thompson, Rowan Atkinson, Richard Curtis, Ben Elton, David Shore, Susanne Bier, and Armando Iannucci among them, and supported by a family that anchored him through years of intense production. Across genres and decades, he has balanced intelligence with feeling, precision with play, becoming one of the United Kingdom's most versatile and recognizable performers.

Our collection contains 17 quotes who is written by Hugh, under the main topics: Witty One-Liners - Ethics & Morality - Live in the Moment - Parenting - Success.

Other people realated to Hugh: Michael J. Fox (Actor), John Le Carre (Author), Olivia Wilde (Actress), Geena Davis (Actress), Robbie Coltraine (Actor), Omar Epps (Actor), Amber Tamblyn (Actress), David Morse (Actor), Sela Ward (Actress), Robbie Coltrane (Actor)