Barry Humphries Biography

Fast Facts

• At the 1999 British Comedy Awards he received a Lifetime Achievement Award
• On the 50th anniversary of the first appearance of his character Dame Edna Everage, a special silver Australian one-dollar coin was issued in her honor
• The Barry Award, an annual trophy and cash prize presented to the best comedy act at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival, is named for him
• Quote: "(On the widespread assumption that his 2006 show would be his last) "I wonder what they mean․ I suppose they mean I can't go on forever, but whenever people ask me, 'How do you do so much?' I say, 'How do you do so little?'""
• He appeared as Estragon in Australia's first stage production of the Samuel Beckett play "Waiting for Godot․"
• He is best known for creating his alter-egos Dame Edna Everage, a flamboyant Australian housewife and talk-show host, and Sir Les Patterson, an outrageously crude Australian cultural attaché
• A comic strip character he created, Barry McKenzie, became so popular that two successful Australian comedy films were made about him