Comedian Ricky Gervais Tells a Serious Story About How He Learned to Write Creatively

in Creativity, Writing | October 9th, 2013 8 Comments

Ricky Ger­vais, the cre­ator of The Office, rarely gets out of his com­ic per­sona. It’s usu­al­ly  laughs, schtick, and more laughs. But when Fast Com­pa­ny pinned him down and asked him about “the sin­gle biggest influ­ence on his cre­ative process,” he turned seri­ous (after a few more laughs) and talked about a for­ma­tive moment with a child­hood Eng­lish teacher. The teacher taught him this: you’re bet­ter off writ­ing … Nev­er mind, I’ll let Ricky tell the tale. It’s his sto­ry after all.

via Mash­able

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Ricky Ger­vais Presents “Learn Gui­tar with David Brent”

“Learn Eng­lish With Ricky Ger­vais,” A New Pod­cast Debuts (NSFW)

Sein­feld, Louis C.K., Chris Rock, and Ricky Ger­vais Dis­sect the Craft of Com­e­dy (NSFW)


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Comments (8)
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  • chrisrivers5 says:
    October 9, 2013 at 7:18 pm

    I love his com­ment “mak­ing the ordi­nary extra­or­di­nary.” Hon­esty sells. I lit­er­al­ly replayed the last minute a cou­ple times. Thanks for putting this togeth­er.

    Reply
  • Dick Buggery says:
    October 9, 2013 at 8:34 pm

    The back­ground music to thus under­wlehms what he’s say­ing.

    Reply
  • estellahorlacher says:
    October 9, 2013 at 10:13 pm

    u043cy cou03c5u0455u03b9u0274 u03b9u0455 u043cu03b1u0138u03b9u0274u0262 $51/u043dou03c5r ou0274lu03b9u0274e. u03c5u0274eu043cployed u0493or u03b1 cou03c5ple ou0493 yeu03b1ru0455 u03b1u0274d prevu03b9ou03c5u0455 yeu03b1r u0455u043de u0262ou0442 u03b1 $1u0417619cu043decu0138 wu03b9u0442u043d ou0274lu03b9u0274e jou0432 u0493or u03b1 cou03c5ple ou0493 du03b1yu0455. u0455ee u043core u03b1u0442…­ ­ViewMore——————————————&#46qr&#46net/kAgknnnnThanks for putting this togeth­er.,

    Reply
  • Anthony says:
    October 10, 2013 at 1:22 am

    Kei­th John­stone talks in length about being obvi­ous and aver­age in your cre­ativ­i­ty because that is when you are at your most unique and orig­i­nal and cre­ative. Because it is actu­al­ly YOU, not some­thing you are TRYING to be like. Get it?

    Reply
  • DLJ says:
    October 10, 2013 at 4:57 am

    The cam­era man deserves a punch in the head. Pre­ten­tious tit. Good sto­ry though.

    Reply
    • Craig Good says:
      October 11, 2013 at 8:49 am

      I think you mean the direc­tor, who told the cam­era oper­a­tors to do all that. It gives the impres­sion that the sub­ject is so unin­ter­est­ing that they have to keep you awake with cam­era move­ment. The direc­tor should have had more con­fi­dence in Ricky.

      Reply

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