Having met at Oxford University in 1986, Stewart Lee, from Solihull in the West Midlands, and Richard Herring, of Cheddar, Somerset formed a strong friendship & working partnership. Both expressed an interest in writing good comedy that "wasn't just a rip-off of Monty Python". Together, they embarked on a mission to write stuff that they thought was clever, interesting, and - most importantly - funny. They both wrote & performed in student shows, notably"The Seven Raymonds" which was taken up to the Edinburgh Festival and brought them some attention from people other than their college peers.

After University, Rich & Stew abandoned their respective courses, and concentrated on writing. They soon began to carve a niche for themselves on radio, starting at first writing for Radio 4's "Weekending".

Over subsequent interviews, neither claim to have enjoyed writing trite satirical gags for the Weekending team to hurl at the listening public, but it paid the rent. All the while, both Rich & Stew were cutting their teeth on the London Stand-Up Circuit. Rich would eventually give this up, but Stewart was fast becoming a successful stand-up in his own right. To that end, Stand-up is something he's always pursued alongside other projects.

Writing for Weekending, as joyless as it was, was not without it's benefits. Rich & Stew's contribution had not gone un-noticed, and resulted in them being asked to write for "The End Of The Road Show". This was basically a spoof on the "Roadshow" idea that had been popular with the controllers at Radio One. It was presented by Neil Mularkey, Nick Hancock & Tony Hawks, all the material was provided by Rich & Stew.

The title character of Lionel Nimrod was brought to life by ex-Dr. Who Tom Baker, while the show itself was anchored by Rich & Stew & all characters were performed by them, alongside Armando & Rebecca Front, another member of the On The Hour team.
Lionel Nimrod.. was, by all accounts, a runaway success & resulted in an offer for another show.

Relocating to Radio One, Lee & Herring hit the "mainstream" with "Lee & Herring's Fist Of Fun"

"Fist Of Fun" was broadcast from a number of different venues across the country, which was initially problematic, but ended up cementing the duo's relationship with someone who would ultimately become a long-standing contributor and friend, Kevin Eldon. Kevin & Stewart had met on the stand-up circuit, and this is how he ended up with Lee & Herring, in Stew's words;

These shows were peppered with contributions from Kevin Eldon, Peter Baynham, Sally Phillips, Ronni Ancona, and many others.
Material from these shows has since been culled for all of their TV work - and the overall feel of the shows established a remarkably conversational relationship with their fans who were invited to ring in and contribute ideas to the show over the weeks. The first TV series of Fist Of Fun, for example, debuted "The Gall-Ery" which was the culmination of a plea from Rich & Stew for their radio listeners to send in as much random stuff as they could think of.

Between the radio & television shows, Rich & Stew managed to find time to tour and guest on other people's radio shows (notably Armando Iannucci's), They benefited from the higher profile that their regular appearances in the nation's media had given them & they soon gained possibly the largest comedy following on the circuit at the time.
Not willing to rest on their laurels, Stew continued solo standup & Rich worked on his plays. Almost every Edinburgh Festival signals the arrival of new solo material from both parties, alongside the double-act show. In some circles, Rich is known more for his work as a playwright than as a comedian.

After a second series of "Fist Of Fun" aired on television in early 1996, relationships between Lee & Herring & the BBC became strained. Discussions with BBC television came to an end when producers wanted more Fist Of Fun, but wanted them to change the style.
Rich & Stew also wanted more Fist Of Fun, but didn't want to change the format of the show. Eventually, no compromise could be reached & talks fell flat.

The duo also made an offer to produce a fourth series of their acclaimed radio shows, but this was declined by Radio bosses who were trying to restructure the station. Despite this stance, they did chop up the preceding three series and put together a series of "Best Of..." compilations which not only did the material no justice whatsoever, but was underpinned by a mix of current hits. This bed of top forty mediocrity was contrary to the musical agenda the duo had created in the original shows and didn't work in context against the sketches & Studio banter.
Adding insult to injury, Rich & Stew weren't even informed of this compilation by the BBC until it was airing!

In early 1998, however, Lee & Herring made a surprise return to BBC2 screens in "This Morning With Richard Not Judy", a live 45 minute show that would air on Sunday lunchtimes. It was based loosely on a show of the same name that the pair had performed at the Edinburgh Festival in previous years, the origins of which actually go as far back as a Richard Herring solo show from the Festival in 1994.

The show introduced new characters to the Lee & Herring universe, (such as "The Curious Orange" & "The Organ Gang"), visualized old radio sketches ("Histor's Eye"), and extended work from previous shows ("The Two Very Different Teachers" sketch from Fist Of Fun returned in a regular slot over the latter half of the series).

This Morning With Richard Not Judy (TMWRNJ) managed to successfully combine the wonderful live atmosphere that Lee & Herring had managed to capture so well in their radio shows with the tightly scripted sketches from Fist Of Fun. However, it wasn't the runaway success it could (should?) have been.
This can be blamed largely on a lack of backing from the BBC. Minimal promotion was done for the show, and the edited repeats (that were aired in the following week) were often knocked around in the schedules.
It seemed apparent that Rich & Stew were getting tired of poor treatment from the Beeb, and sadly this was sometimes reflected their performances.

Another live tour followed on the back of the TV series, taking Lee & Herring back on the road, encompassing the Edinburgh festival & many venues up & down the country and, in a surprise move, the BBC commissioned more material from Rich & Stew. This one-off show took the form of a 20 minute addition to the BBC2 theme night "Monster Night". Presented by Bill Bailey, the night's programming revolved around reminiscipackages about monster movies and the like. Lee & Herring's contribution involved them watching "The World's Nine Scariest Monsters.....With Carol Vorderman" & passing judgment on it. A nice little piece of whimsy by Lee & Herring standards, and a strong sketch in it's own right. A script of it can be found on the official site, and hopefully we'll have a version of it up here soon.

On two different occasions I was planning to do the edit for the Friday (repeated) show on Thursday, and then found out by looking in Time Out that it was on Thursday night. We were doing a show where even the people in it didn't know when it was going out."

As a result of this insensitive treatment, Lee & Herring have as good as severed their relationships with the BBC.
Stewart has vowed never to work for them again while current standards are in place, and has continued his work as Harry Hill's script editor over three series and a christmas special of the bald comic's Channel Four show.
He also directed a pilot show of Cluub Zarathrustra for the station which featured the talents of Simon Munnery, Kevin Eldon, Johnny Vegas and others. Cluub Z had initially originated in Edinburgh as a "kind of Dada-ist cabaret show".
This appears to have been shelved by Channel Four, and a variant on the theme, "Attention Scum" fronted by Munnery's "League Against Tedium" character surfaced on BBC2 in early 2001. Stewart directed this too, and did make a brief cameo appearance as part of the supporting cast.

Sadly this show was treated with as much contempt as TMWRNJ. Any potential second series was cancelled before the first was even aired, it was pushed into a late Sunday night slot, and given no advertising at all, despite being nominated for a Golden Rose of Montreal Award.
This has, understandably, added to Lee's anti-BBC stance.

The Lee & Herring double-act seems, sadly, to be no more. This is partly due to lack of backing, and partly due to the success of their individual projects. While neither rule out a return to the double act, it seems that they've taken it as far as they could, and that more could be gained by working on different projects.
There is no animosity between the two, and they often contribute to each other's work.
However, the pair did work together again in early 2002. They took part in "Real Time", an online Dr. Who adventure. Rich appears "Taylor Renchard" & Stew plays "Ryan Carey"
The recordings were released over the internet recently, and the shows can be found on the BBC web site at this link.