The Mighty Boosh

The Mighty Boosh is a British surreal musical comedy troupe based in London.

Formed in 1998 by Julian Barratt (originally from Leeds, Yorkshire) and Noel Fielding (originally from Croydon, London), the core group went on to include Michael Fielding, Rich Fulcher and Dave Brown (– the latter of which plays a talking Gorilla named ‘Bollo’ throughout all series).

The show had recurring appearances from now-well-known comedians such as Richard Ayoade, Matt Berry and Simon Farnaby.

Originally a radio show, after a TV pilot in 2003, the troupe’s eponymous TV series aired between 2004 and 2007, produced by veteran comedian and actor Steve Coogan.

The troupe is best known for creating a new genre of comic rap music known as ‘crimp’ (or ‘crimping’). These short humorous and surreal acapella pieces would typically be under a minute in length, with the exception of the much longer crimp known as ‘The Four Way Crimp’, which is intended for 4 singers/rappers (or ‘crimpers’).

After a couple of ventures into live theatre shows based on their TV material, the group disbanded in 2009 after Barratt & Fielding decided to venture into cinema and individual solo TV projects, respectively. The troupe reunited briefly in 2013 but as of 2021 are still indefinitely on hiatus.

Noel Fielding wrote and starred in his own surreal comedy show on Channel 4 called ‘Luxury Comedy’ (2012). Since 2017, Fielding has been a co-presenter of the cooking competition show, The Great British Bake-Off, on the BBC along with fellow comedian and co-presenter Matt Lucas – as well as also being a regular guest on topical British panel shows.

Julian Barratt has become a comic actor in British cinema and theatre, having starred in independent British comedy films such as Bunny and the Bull (2009), which co-starred Boosh regular Farnaby, and the successful Mindhorn (2016), which was distributed on StudioCanal (United Kingdom) and
Netflix (Worldwide).