Jimmy Carr

Born James Anthony Patrick Carr Junior on 15 September 1972 in Isleworth West London, Jimmy Carr is the second of three brothers. His parents were accountant James Anthony Patrick Carr Senior and Mary née Lawlor both from Limerick in Ireland. Jimmy Carr has both British and Irish citizenship.

Jimmy Carr spent most of his early years in Slough and was educated at Farnham Common School, Burnham Grammar and went on to sixth form at the Royal Grammar School in High Wycombe. He gained four ‘A’ grades GCE Advanced Level exams and went on to Gonville and Caius College at Cambridge to read political science and graduate with a 2.1 in 1993.

After university Carr went to work for Shell Oil as a marketing executive, a job which he described to Jeremy Clarkson on Top Gear as ‘technically the easiest job on the planet.’ He went on to say interspersed with Clarkson’s responses ‘do you have a fuel gauge in your car?’ – ‘Yeah’ – ‘You know when that goes into the red?’ – ‘Yeah’ – ‘Buy some petrol.’

Carr lives in North London with his girlfriend Karoline Copping, a commissioning editor for Channel 5 and later Channel 4.

Stand-up Comedy

Throughout each year Jimmy Carr does sell stand-up tours almost since the beginning. The first DVD of one of his live shows was recorded at London’s Bloomsbury Theatre and was released in November 2004 entitled Jimmy Carr Live. Before the end of 2014, DVDs of his live shows including the one just mentioned number eight releases.

Jimmy Carr’s stand-up tours have been seen by over 1·5 million people and internationally has played to audiences in Australia, Canada, Ireland and South Africa.

Stand-up DVDs

Television

Jimmy Carr is best known for hosting his own TV game shows on Channel 4 such as Distraction, Your Face or Mine?, and 8 out of 10 Cats which started in 2005 and began its nineteenth series in February 2015. Before the end of 2014, 180 episodes of 8 out of 10 Cats have been aired. The spin-off crossover show 8 out of 10 Cats does Countdown began in 2012 and 33 episodes had been aired by the end of 2014.

Carr has also presented the 100s series of programmes such as 100 worst Pop Records, 100 Worst Britons etc. as well as the annual Big Fat Quiz of the Year, All for Channel 4. He has co-hosted several other shows including Channel 4s 2010 Alternative Election Night.

Carr has appeared as a guest panellist on a number of shows including Have I Got News for You? Never Mind the Buzzcocks and A League of their Own. He has appeared on the BBC TV show Qi 28 times

Jimmy Carr is a fan of the BBC TV show Top Gear and appeared as a guest in a reasonably priced car in Series 5, Episode 4 and went to the top of the leader board with a lap time of 1 minute 46·9 seconds.

Other Media

Among his radio appearances, Carr is a regular guest on BBC Radio 4’s Loose Ends and BBC Radio Scotland’s The Fred MacAulay Show. In 2006, Carr co-wrote a book with Lucy Greeves entitled The Naked Jape: Uncovering the Hidden World of Jokes on the subject of the history and theory of joke-telling. By the end of 2014, Jimmy Carr had 4·6 million followers on Twitter.