Matt Roper

Matt Roper is a British comedian, writer and musician.

Career

Roper made his stand-up debut in the late-1990s and is noted for his work as a writer-performer in sketch comedy and revue on the London fringe during that period; the satirical sketch show Newsrevue at the Canal Cafe Theatre, Nice Mischief and A Touch of Roberts and Roper^[1] at Jermyn Street Theatre. Performing stand-up comedy, he became one of the first comics to play the Manchester Comedy Store, appearing regularly at the Buzz Club and in the East Dulwich Cabaret's All New Stand-up Show.^[2]

Roper first gained prominence with his creation of the stage character Wilfredo, a grotesque satire of a Mediterranean romantic singer. The character is notoriously ill-mannered; frequently salivating onstage, drinking and smoking his way throughout songs, while berating his musicians and audience members with insults and expletives.^[2][3] The character has divided critics, leading them to proclaim him as "strangely endearing",^[4] "utterly charming and uplifting",^[5] "unlikeable",^[6] "quite inappropriate"^[7] and "a genius creation".^[7]

With Wilfredo and his band, Roper has toured the British summer festival circuit, counting the Glastonbury Festival^[8][9][10] among his successes on several occasions. In July 2010 Wilfredo became the surprise hit of the Port Eliot Literary Festival, appearing onstage with Jarvis Cocker.^[11] Roper has presented the character at the Café de Paris, the Tobacco Factory in Bristol, Brighton Komedia and at London's Leicester Square Theatre in addition to touring internationally. He has performed the character at festivals worldwide, touring to Spain,^[12] Italy,^[13][14] the Czech Republic,^[15] Germany,^[16] Hungary,^[17] Slovakia,^[18] South Africa,^[19] the Philippines, Australia and Argentina.^[20][21]

In May 2011, Roper played the Devil in Terry Newman's political satire Lucifer: My Part in the New Labour Project (And How I Invented Coalition Government) – a multi-character solo performance – in London and for the Brighton Festival.^[22]

In June 2011, Roper appeared as Wilfredo in the first series of Rufus Hound's What's So Funny? for BBC Radio 7 (now BBC Radio 4 Extra).^[23] In December 2011 Wilfredo recorded the Christmas Day edition of The Comedy Club Interviews for BBC Radio 4 Extra.^[24] 2011 also saw an appearance on Arthur Smith's Pissed Up Chat Show at the E4 Udderbelly at the Southbank Centre.

With comedian Pippa Evans under the guise of Loretta Maine, Roper co-wrote and recorded the song 'Happy Goddamn Christmas', released on 1 December 2012, peaking at No. 6 on the iTunes UK Comedy Charts.^[25] An accompanying video was released on 13 December, featuring cameos by Arthur Smith, Imran Yusuf, Ruth Bratt and Thom Tuck, via BBC Three.^[26] Also with Evans, he co-wrote and recorded the single 'Peace All Over The World (At Christmas Time)', released 8 December 2014 and reportedly banned by BBC Radio 2 who were "worried that sensitive listeners would be offended".^[27]

In September 2014, Roper joined the line-up of the surreal sketch comedy group The Greatest Show on Legs, debuting in Leipzig, Germany.^[28]

Roper presently resides in Harlem, New York City.^[29][30] He makes regular appearances under the guise of characters at the Slipper Room in Manhattan's Lower East Side.^[30]

On April 14, 2016 it was announced that Roper is to play Chico Marx, eldest of the Marx Brothers, in I'll Say She Is: The Lost Marx Brothers Musical, set to open on May 28, 2016 Off-Broadway at the Connelly Theater in New York City.^[31]

Roper blogs for the Huffington Post's UK edition^[32] and is a writer for PictureBox Films; an SVOD division of NBC Universal Pictures.

Edinburgh Festival Fringe

At the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, Roper has presented three feature length solo shows, Wilfredo: Erecto! (2011), The Wonderful World of Wilfredo (2012) and Wilfredo: Deconstructed (2014). Drawing positive comment and reviews in the press, Wilfredo was described by the Guardian newspaper as "weird, intimate and wonderful"^[33] and by Time Out as "an extraordinary creation who cuts a hacking, spluttering, beer dribbling figure upon the stage".^[34] The comedy industry website Chortle observed the character as "cantankerous, often lecherous and almost certainly consumptive, coughing and burping his way through the set, at one point hacking up phlegm like a horse chewing a toffee."^[35]

At the 2012 Edinburgh Festival, Roper appeared opposite Phil Nichol in a one-off performance at the Traverse Theatre for Theatre Uncut's season of radical playlets, playing an advertising executive representing a global corporation, in Indulge by the Icelandic playwright Andri Snaer Magnuson.^[36]

In 2015, Roper accepted the Malcolm Hardee Award for Cunning Stunt of the Year, awarded to a group or individual annually for performing elaborate publicity stunts to promote their festival appearance. He had gained access to a social media account belonging to Kate Copstick, head comedy critic of the influential Scotsman newspaper, writing a glowing review of his own talents under her name.^[37][38]

Politics

In November 2014, Roper was among 44 comedians to sign an open letter to Dapper Laughs published nationally in the Independent newspaper, protesting "encouraging rape culture and normalising sexism" in his ITV2 series, which was subsequently cancelled.^[39][40] He is a member of the Save Soho movement, a collective of artists who oppose the ongoing closure and demolition of music venues and independent businesses within the London neighbourhood, adding his signature to a letter to Boris Johnson in 2014.^[41] Roper is a long-time supporter of the British Labour Party and many of its causes. He is also a supporter of the British-based NGO Burma Campaign UK.^[42]

Personal life

Roper is the son of the late British comedian George Roper.^[43] He currently resides in New York City.

Discography

• Happy Goddamn Christmas - Loretta Maine feat. Matt Roper (single, 2012)
• The Wonderful World of Wilfredo - Wilfredo (album, 2014)
• Peace All Over the World (At Christmas Time) - Wilfredo feat. the Great Carmella (single, 2014)
• Wilfredo Unchained: Live in California - Wilfredo (album, 2015)

References

External links

• So It Goes – An Interview with Matt Roper So It Goes. John Fleming: 'The indiscreet charm of a slobbering, innocent singer at the Edinburgh Fringe'. Matt Roper Interviewed.
• Matt Roper at the Huffington Post Profile.