Well-known actor and comedian Stephen John Coogan for his creative work earned five BAFTA awards - the British Academy of Motion Picture and Television Arts, and was repeatedly nominated for an Oscar and Golden Globe. In addition to the acting profession, he is involved in writing scripts and producing.
Biography
The future actor was born in the English city of Manchester in 1965. His parents were from Ireland. The head of the Kuganov family worked as an engineer at IBM, and my mother was a housewife - she looked after six children. In the family, few people were involved in the art world, although Steve's grandfather in the fifties created a dance hall for Irish immigrants, where they could meet, socialize and have fun.
Steve's family was religious, all children were brought up in the Catholic faith, so they studied at Cardinal Langley's Roman Catholic high school. However, with age, many of them became atheists.
From childhood, Kugan had a talent for acting, and he wanted to go to study at a theater school. Parents and teachers discouraged him, saying that this is a very unstable profession, and that there is no money to make.
However, Steve was persistent: five times he applied to various theater schools in London, but everything was unsuccessful. However, then he was accepted into the theater company New Music, where he began his career. And then he still managed to get an education at the Manchester Polytechnic School of Drama, where he met with future partner in the profession John Thompson.
After graduating from the theater school, the young actor began his career as a comedian: he worked in comedy television and radio programs. For a long time, Steve could be seen in "Spitting Image" ("Replica Replica") - a puppet television series where famous politicians and public figures were parodied.
In 1989, he appeared on a project of specially shot sketches in the Observation series in the ITV The Krypton Factor game show and received audience recognition. In 1992, he was waiting for recognition from critics: the actor received the Perrier Award for the program "Steve Coogan and John Thompson."
However, Kugan got the greatest fame when he created the character of Alan Partridge and the television series “I Am Alan Partridge” (1997-2002) appeared on television. This is a story about an awkward and ridiculous radio host who was very popular with the audience.
This character was later used to create the movie Alan Partridge: Alpha Father. Coogan himself participated in writing the script for this film and played a major role in it. In the year of release, the picture instantly rose to first place at the box office, and all sessions took place with a full house.
And according to audience polls, Alan Partridge was in seventh place on the list of the hundred most famous television characters. In 2019, this character reappeared on television - he satirically talks about current events in the country and the world.
Movie career
In the movie, Coogan made his debut in a small role in the movie "Resurrected" (1989). This gave him his first experience on the set and the experience of interacting with filming partners. Then in his film career there was a short break, and in 1995 he was invited to the film "Native American in the closet", which received great popularity among the audience. An interesting story about a magic locker was liked by both adults and children.
Kugan was constantly striving to develop in the profession: he starred in various television projects, in films, and in 2001 he became a co-founder of Baby Cow Productions. And for the first film shot by this company, he himself wrote the script. It was a story about a detective in whose eyes a policeman killed a man. Hero of Kugan is torn by doubts: can he bring the villain to clean water?
And again, the film was waiting for luck, again this picture in the year of release became the highest grossing. It so happened that both as an actor and as a screenwriter Steve took place.
There are more than a hundred films in his portfolio, where he acts as an actor, more than forty films in which he was a producer, he wrote about thirty scripts, and in two films he was a composer. This is not counting the work on radio, television and more than sixty films where he played himself.
The best films with the participation of Kugan are considered: "Filomena" (2013), "Divorce in a big city" (2012), "Ruby Sparks" (2012). The best films he produced are: Dancer (2006), Snow Cake (2006). For the film "Philomena" he was twice nominated for an Oscar, and it was especially nice because here he acted not only as a producer, but also as a scriptwriter and actor - he played a major role. In the story, an elderly woman is looking for her son, who was taken from her when she was very young. The abbess of the monastery, where Filomena was young, did not want to say where her boy was sent, and journalist Martin Sixmith undertook to help her find her son. The duet of Coogan and the famous Judy Danch in this film turned out to be simply amazing, and the audience enthusiastically accepted the picture.
