The comedian Tony Slattery has died aged 65 after a heart attack, his partner announced.
Slattery appeared on the Channel 4 comedy improvisation show Whose Line is it Anyway? and comedy shows Just a Minute and Have I Got News for You.
A statement on behalf of Mark Michael Hutchinson, his partner of more than three decades, said: “It is with great sadness we must announce actor and comedian Tony Slattery, aged 65, has passed away today, Tuesday morning, following a heart attack on Sunday evening.”
Born on 9 November 1959, Slattery was the contemporary of Dame Emma Thompson, Sir Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie at the University of Cambridge.
He was the former president of the improvisation group Cambridge Footlights, and had recently been touring a comedy show in England and launched a podcast, Tony Slattery’s Rambling Club, in October.
Outside standup, Slattery appeared in films in the 1980s and 90s including the crime thriller The Crying Game, Peter’s Friends with Laurie, Fry and Thompson, and the comedy How to Get Ahead in Advertising with Richard E Grant.
He also had prominent roles in the theatre, receiving a 1995 Olivier Award nod for best comedy performance for the Tim Firth play Neville’s Island, which was later made into a film starring Timothy Spall, and starring in the second world war-set production Privates On Parade, based on the film of the same name, as ace impersonator Captain Terri Dennis.
His West End debut was in the 1930s-style musical Radio Times, and on TV he also played a detective in Tiger Bastable, a gentlemen comedy spoof, and the title character in sitcom Just a Gigolo.
In 2020, Slattery – who regularly spoke openly about his bipolar disorder – revealed he went bankrupt after experiencing substance abuse and mental health issues.
He told the Radio Times his “fiscal illiteracy and general innumeracy”, as well as his “misplaced trust in people”, had also contributed to his financial problems.
Slattery released the BBC Two Horizon documentary What’s the Matter with Tony Slattery? in the same year, in which he and Hutchinson visited leading experts on mood disorders and addiction.
He had previously appeared in the 2006 BBC Two programme The Secret Life of the Manic Depressive to speak about his condition.
He said: “I rented a huge warehouse by the River Thames. I just stayed in there on my own, didn’t open the mail or answer the phone for months and months and months. I was just in a pool of despair and mania.”
Slattery also made appearances in the final Carry On film, Carry On Columbus, as well as Robin Hood, Red Dwarf, The English Harem, Cold Blood, The Royal and Coronation Street.
He won the first Perrier Award at the Edinburgh Fringe along with Fry and Thompson, was one of the original patrons of Leicester comedy festival with Norman Wisdom and Sean Hughes, and had been a rector at the University of Dundee.
