Rowan Atkinson, who turns 66 on January 6, is recognised around the world for his iconic character Mr Bean. His fanbase is not bound by age and one can watch his performance again and again. But for the British actor-comedian, playing the popular character has turned “stressful and exhausting”. He recently talked about how the weight to deliver has caught up to him.
Rowan Atkinson had developed Mr Bean while he was studying for his master’s degree at Oxford University and then launched the character on television in 1990. Over the years, he got a sitcom, movies, an animated series and books out of it. But his feelings toward world’s favourite silent clown has changed. Playing Mr Bean is no longer enjoyable to him.
He said, “I don’t much enjoy playing him. The weight of responsibility is not pleasant. I find it stressful and exhausting, and I look forward to the end of it.”
The original sitcom aired from January 1990 to December 1995 and comprised 15 episodes. The series has been sold in 245 territories worldwide and has even inspired an animated spin-off as well as two theatrical feature-length films, starring Rowan Atkinson himself.
He is also currently working on an animated Mr Bean movie. If it’s so taxing, why is he still working on the movie? He explained, “Having made an animated TV series, we’re now in the foothills of developing an animated movie for Mr Bean, it’s easier for me to perform the character vocally than visually.”
The Johnny English star said Mr Bean’s success was never surprising to him. He always believed that watching an adult behave in a childish way, totally unaware of his inappropriateness was fundamentally funny. “The fact the comedy is visual rather than verbal means it has been successful internationally, too,” he said.
The actor expressed his views about cancel culture and equated it to a medieval mob. He was quoted as saying, “The problem we have online is that an algorithm decides what we want to see, which ends up creating a simplistic, binary view of society. It becomes a case of either you’re with us or against us. And if you’re against us, you deserve to be ‘cancelled.’”
He added, “It’s important that we’re exposed to a wide spectrum of opinion, but what we have now is the digital equivalent of the medieval mob roaming the streets looking for someone to burn. So it is scary for anyone who’s a victim of that mob and it fills me with fear about the future.”
However Rowan Atkinson might feel, we will always love Mr Bean
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