Portal:Atheism/Selected biography/7
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Ricky Dene Gervais (IPA: [dʒɜːˈveɪz]) (born June 25, 1961) is an Emmy, Golden Globe and BAFTA award-winning English comic writer and performer from Reading, Berkshire. Gervais found mainstream fame with his BBC Two television programme The Office, which he co-wrote and co-directed with his friend and collaborator Stephen Merchant. Besides writing and directing the show, Gervais played the lead role of David Brent. In 2005, Gervais and Merchant returned to BBC Television with their sitcom, Extras.
In an interview given to John Humphrys he said, "Being an atheist makes someone a clearer-thinking, fairer person... They [atheists] are not doing things to be rewarded in heaven; they're doing things because they're right, because they live by a moral code". Andy Millman, the character he plays in his and Merchants sitcom Extras, also holds this view.
