Alan Davies' Teenage Revolution

Early life and education

Alan Roger Davies was born on 6 March 1966 in Loughton, Essex, and grew up in Chingford. He has an older brother and a younger sister. When he was six, his mother died from leukaemia, and he was raised by his father, a Scout leader, with help from his paternal grandparents.

Davies has written that he was sexually abused by his father from age 8 to 13, and that his brother and sister were turned against him. He attended Staples Road School and was privately educated at Bancroft's School, gaining eight O-Levels. He later studied at Loughton College of Further Education and graduated in Drama and Theatre Studies from the University of Kent at Canterbury in 1988.

Career

Davies began performing comedy in 1988 at the Whitstable Labour Club. He won the Edinburgh Festival Critics Award for Comedy in 1994, and his show from that year was released as Alan Davies Live at the Lyric. A version of his West End show Urban Trauma was broadcast on BBC One in 1998. In 2012 he toured with Life is Pain, and in 2025 he undertook his first tour in ten years, Think Ahead.

He hosted Alan's Big One on Radio 1 in 1994 and 1995, and appeared in Channel 4's spoof travel show One for the Road. From 1997 to 2016 he played the title role in Jonathan Creek, which won a BAFTA for Best Drama. He co-wrote and starred in The Alan Davies Show on radio in 1998, and played Russell Boyd in A Many Splintered Thing.

In 2001 he played Robert Gossage in Bob and Rose, winning Best Actor at the Monte Carlo TV Festival. He appeared on Top Gear in 2003 and again in Series 8. From the mid-1990s to 2002 he advertised for Abbey National.

Books

Davies's first book, My Favourite People and Me, 1978–88, was published in September 2009. The memoir recalls his childhood and teenage interests, including Arsenal F.C., and was released in paperback as Rebel Without A Clue: How the 80s Made Me.

His second memoir, Just Ignore Him, published in September 2020, details the sexual abuse he suffered from his father between ages 8 and 13. The police and CPS accepted his accusations but declined to prosecute due to his father's Alzheimer's disease and advanced age. His third book, White Male Stand-Up, was published in September 2025 and reappraises his stand-up career in light of his childhood experiences.

Personal life

Davies married Katie Maskell, a writer, on 13 January 2007 after meeting her backstage at QI in 2005. Bill Bailey was his best man. The couple have three children. He is a pescetarian and narrated an anti-vivisection video for Animal Aid in 2006.

In late 2007, it was reported that he bit the ear of a homeless man; Davies later said the man had called him a cunt several times. He was banned from the Groucho Club following the incident. Davies is a lifelong Arsenal F.C. fan and hosts the podcast The Tuesday Club. He supports the Labour Party and initially voted for Jeremy Corbyn but supported Owen Smith in the 2016 leadership election.

Did You Know?

• He was named Time Out's Best Young Comic in 1991.
• Davies's father remarried in 1982, when Davies was 16.