Matthew Kelly

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article or section includes a list of references or external links, but its sources remain unclear because it lacks in-text citations. You can improve this article by introducing more precise citations.

Sections should be added to this article, to conform with Wikipedia's Manual of Style. Please discuss this issue on the talk page. This article has been tagged since November 2007.

Matthew Kelly (born, 9 May 1950, Urmston, Lancashire, England) is an English actor, who made his name as a television presenter.

As a child Kelly lived on Primrose Avenue in the town and became interested in acting at the Urmston Musical Theatre, most notably playing the role of Louis in a production of The King and I in 1963. He retains links with the theatre as their President.

He studied drama at Manchester Polytechnic and whilst there joined in a theatre group which included Julie Walters, who was training to be a nurse, and Pete Postlethwaite. On graduating he made his professional debut at the Pavilion Theatre in Rhyl. After this debut he appeared regularly at Liverpool's Everyman Theatre in the early 1970s.

However he made his name as a television presenter, first becoming famous as part of the original team on Game for a Laugh. For the next fourteen years his work centred on light entertainment shows such as You Bet! and, most notably, Stars in Their Eyes which he took over from Leslie Crowther - initially on a part time basis until Crowther could not return due to ill health, and went on to host for 11 years until March, 2004. He was also the first CITV presenter and continued to act occasionally, notably in the Channel 4 comedy, Relative Strangers.

After leaving Stars in their Eyes, Kelly declared that he would be returning to acting full time and would leave light entertainment behind. To this end he has appeared in a number of television and theatre productions. In 2005 he was a member of the cast in BBC One's Bleak House as Mr. Turveydrop. He also played a serial killer in 2005's Cold Blood and its 2007 sequel, as well as the explorer Giovanni Belzoni in BBC One's Egypt.

On the stage he won an Olivier Award in 2003 for his portrayal of Lenny in John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men at the Savoy Theatre. Other work includes Ripafratta in Mirandolina at the Royal Exchange Theatre in August 2006 which he swiftly followed by appearing as a well received Salieri in Peter Shaffer's play Amadeus.

In 2007 Kelly starred in the play Forgotten Voices at the Riverside Studios in Hammersmith, London and at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, appearing at the Assembly Rooms.

[edit] Personal life

He is married to Sarah who lives with their two children in Cheshire whilst he divides his time between there and a house in Chiswick.

In January 2003 he was arrested after an allegation that he had sexually abused a boy under 16. All charges were subsequently dropped. In October 2003 while being interviewed on Frank Skinner's talk show, Kelly confronted the host about his "horrible" jokes about his sex abuse case, leaving Skinner very red faced.