Andy Benett

Comedy, acty, terrorist funding type

'Andy started his acting career at primary school by improvising some stand-up during a medieval yuletide feast. From that point on, he was hooked, and proceeded to chew his way through a whole raft of stage roles at school, starting with Dickensian villains, before progressing through Shakespearean villains to the giddy heights of Brechtian villains.

Whilst still a youngster, Andy enjoyed a season with Manchester Youth Theatre in 1993, and directed his first production later that year. However, like many struggling actors, Andy was forced to leave school upon completing exams. A masterless troubadour, he wandered the country seeking patronage until he found solace in Norwich-based theatre company, Crude Apache.

Andy served Crude Apache well as he unleashed a variety of villainous roles, culminating in a peerless performance of Henry V, where he played a villainous priest, a villainous traitor, and a soldier who wasn’t really a villain. Andy’s last role for Crude Apache was the title role in Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus, a play about a guy who is really quite villainous, but in a tragic sort of a way.

Thrilled to have broken free of his villainous typecasting mould, Andy teamed up with Tom Butterworth and Will Averill, and Axis of Evil Productions was born. Between them, the trio have written, directed and staged eight episodes of the theatre sitcom The Coalition, the social satire Bombing For Dummies, and numerous performances of the Sh*tty Deal Puppet Theatre Company, as well as shooting and editing some damn fine film shorts and spoofs. Andy started performing stand-up comedy in 2008, and can usually be booked for the price of a beer or two.'