Best known as one-half of a popular British comedy team that also included Matt Lucas, comedic writer and actor David Walliams soared to fame on the back of the hit program that he and Lucas created during the early 2000s, Little Britain. A sketch comedy revue that coupled the irreverence of Saturday Night Live with a quintessentially English sensibility, this program quickly evolved into a British institution, and garnered legions of American fans, as well, when it ran on BBC America; its popularity prompted HBO to pick up the international rights for an American remake, christened Little Britain USA.
Born David Williams in Surrey, England, in August 1971, Walliams grew up as the son of a lab technician mother and a father employed by London Transport. He studied at Reigate Grammar School and Bristol University, then enrolled in the National Youth Theater, where he and Lucas met and developed a fast friendship. The duo teamed up to create a music-themed spoof series, Rock Profile, in 1999. Though it evaded hit status, it did become something of a cult phenomenon, and inspired Walliams and Lucas to try again; the result, of course, was Little Britain (2003).
On the side, Walliams also essayed on-camera comedic roles from time to time, in films including Clancy's Kitchen (1998), Tristram Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story (2005), Capturing Mary (2007), and Run, Fat Boy, Run (2007). In 2008, Walliams provided the voice of Bulgy Bear in Andrew Adamson and Walden Media's big-budget fantasy The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian. He appeared in both Dinner for Schmucks and Marmaduke in 2010, and that same year he reteamed with Matt Lucas for the series Come Fly with Me.
