Richard Thomas Osman was born on 28 November 1970 in Billericay, Essex, to Brenda Wright and David Osman, and grew up in Cuckfield near Haywards Heath, West Sussex. When he was nine years old, his father walked out on the family, which Osman says created difficulty for the rest of his life. His mother attended teacher training college and found making money to support her family a struggle.[2] His older brother is the musician Mat Osman, bass guitarist with the rock band Suede.[3]
Osman attended Warden Park School in Cuckfield.[4] While still at school, he gained his first broadcasting experience, as a regular contributor to Turn It Up, an open-access music show which went out on Sunday evenings on BBC Radio Sussex (the show was also notable for giving early broadcast experience to BBC news journalist Jane Hill and radio DJ Jo Whiley). From 1989 to 1992, he studied Politics and Sociology at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he was a contemporary of Pointless co-presenter Alexander Armstrong, who read English.[5][6]
From 2009 until 2022, Osman co-presented the BBC One teatime quiz showPointless with host Alexander Armstrong. He created the show where he is jokingly known as Armstrong's "pointless friend". Having previously worked exclusively in behind-the-camera roles, Osman got the job as co-presenter/assistant when he pitched the idea for the show to a panel of BBC daytime heads, taking the role of the assistant in the demonstration.[12][13]
Osman guest hosted Have I Got News for You in October 2013.[13][14] In 2014, he began presenting a new BBC Two quiz show called Two Tribes. A second series began airing in February 2015.[15] From October 2014, he guest-presented episodes of The One Show. Beginning in 2016, he was a team captain on the BBC Two comedy panel show Insert Name Here, hosted by Sue Perkins. A second series was commissioned to begin airing in January 2017.
In February and December 2016, he presented Dragons' Den: Pitches to Riches, two special episodes which looked back over the past thirteen series of Dragons' Den on BBC Two. Since 2016, Osman has presented Child Genius on Channel 4.[16] He appeared on the telethon Red Nose Day 2017 with The World Cup of Biscuits 2017. This involved polling with Twitter to find the best British biscuit. In April 2017 he appeared in the first episode of the third series of Murder in Successville.
In 2017, he began hosting his show Richard Osman's House of Games. Each weekday, four panelists compete in general knowledge tests in a variety of entertaining games. Six series of the show have been made. In 2020, Osman created a spin-off show titled House of Games Night, which aired on BBC One on Friday nights.
On 8 April 2022, Osman announced he would be leaving Pointless, after 1,300 episodes across 30 series. After his The Thursday Murder Club series received critical acclaim, he wished to spend more time as an author. He is, however, continuing to appear on the spin-off Pointless Celebrities. In a statement, he said, "Pointless has been a joy from start to finish, working alongside my friend Alexander Armstrong, backed by the most wonderful team, and for the best viewers in the world. I will miss everyone so much, but I'm thrilled I'll still be presenting the celebrity shows. I can't thank everyone enough for 12 amazing years." He was replaced by a rotating series of guest presenters. His co-host Armstrong said, "Daytime television's loss is international best-selling crime fiction's gain. I say that like it's a consolation - I'm going to miss the big man next to me Monday to Friday. But at least I still get him at weekends - and weekdays if you're watching on Challenge".[17]
In 2016, he was a contestant on the second series of Taskmaster and appeared on the darts show Let's Play Darts.
Literary career
Viking Press, a subsidiary of Penguin Random House, acquired the rights to Osman's debut novel, The Thursday Murder Club, and one other novel, for a seven-figure sum in a 10-publisher auction in 2019. It was said that his first book would be published in autumn 2020, and the second the following year, as part of a crime series.[19] His debut crime novel's release date was announced as 3 September 2020.[20]
The Thursday Murder Club series is set in a luxury retirement village in Kent where four residents gather to investigate crime cases, including a "live" murder mystery. Osman said that he was "in talks" for a TV adaptation of his novel.[21] He later confirmed that Steven Spielberg had acquired the book's film rights.[22] The book has sold well over one million copies in the UK, and sold 45,000 UK hardback copies in the first three days after publication.[23]
The first novel in the series was followed by The Man Who Died Twice in 2021, The Bullet That Missed in 2022,[24][25] and The Last Devil To Die in 2023;[26][27] the latter reached number-one on the New York Times Best Seller list.[28] A fifth book is planned for release in 2025.[29]
Osman's upcoming book, We Solve Murders, will be the first in a new series. It is due to be released in September 2024.[30]
Other work
Osman presented The Birthday Game podcast.[31] Since 2021, he has featured in podcast adverts for premium ready-meal brand Charlie Bigham's.[32]
He revealed that he has had a food addiction since childhood and said that he had therapy for the disorder, but believed that it would be lifelong.[33][34]
On 9 June 2022, Osman was the subject of the BBC's Who Do You Think You Are? in which he discovered that a distant relative had been involved in a celebrated Victorian murder case.[35][36][37]
Personal life
Osman was born with nystagmus, an eye condition that significantly reduces his vision.[38] He learns his scripts by heart as his condition makes it difficult to read an autocue.[39]
^McPhee, Rod (13 August 2014). "Pointless star Richard Osman reveals childhood agony that haunted him for decades". mirror. Retrieved 2 July 2018. We never had any money or a car. I'm the most middle class man in Britain now, but I was never brought up with houses and foreign holidays. It must have been so hard for mum, raising us on no money.