Crime definitely pays for former Pointless star RIchard Osman, as Netflix signs the second of his whodunnit novels.
Fresh from the success of The Thursday Murder Club movie, released in August, US streaming giant Netflix is turning his We Solve Murders novel into a full-length drama series. This is despite the fact he hasn’t even finished writing the story about retired cat loving cop Steve Wheeler and his bodyguard daughter-in-law Amy, who tackle crime together on a global scale. “I am really a long way behind,” Richard confesses. “I am stressed about it, if I am honest. But it will be interesting. We sold Thursday Murder Club before the first book had come out!”
The Thursday Murder Club – which saw acting greats Dame Helen Mirren, Pierce Brosnan, Dame Celia Imrie and Sir Ben Kingsley play four retirement home sleuths – was filmed in the English countryside. But Richard, 55, stayed away from filming, saying: “I only went down to the set a couple of times. I was never going to get involved. I like writing and I am aware of the bits of the industry I enjoy.”
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Describing the film industry as “crazy” there were still some enjoyable times for the author. “I got to hang out with the director Chris Columbus,” he smiles. A fan of Celia Imrie, he describes her as “great and naughty” – praising everyone involved in filming. “The premiere was great, but like a grandfather with a child, I was able to hand it back at the end of the day,” he says. “Honestly, I had the most wonderful experience with that whole gang.”
As well as his Netflix success, he is co-writing a new Thursday Murder Club play with Tom Basden, creator of the ITV2 comedy series Plebs. Richard continues: “I am doing the play with the brilliant Tom. His movie The Ballad of Wallis Island is such an amazing film isn’t it? I asked him to do the play before Wallis Island came out, so it makes me look good and he can’t get out of it! It doesn’t matter how many calls he is getting from Hollywood, he is contractually obliged to finish the play.”
Richard, who began his career as a producer on Channel 4 shows such as 8 Out of 10 Cats and the satirical comedy 10 O’Clock Live, has seen his adventures in entertainment change direction many times over the years. As well as a spell as creative director for media company Endemol UK, Richard helped make the short-lived ITV gameshow Prize Island, was script editor and producer on Whose Line Is It Anyway?, developed Total Wipeout for the BBC and created the game show 24 Hour Quiz for ITV. But it was co-presenting BBC1 quiz show Pointless from 2009 until 2022, alongside Alexander Armstrong, who he first met at Cambridge University, that made him a household name.
Nowadays, Richard watches the show at home just to see who he thinks his former uni chum – who he nicknames Zander – truly gets along with. He says: “I did Pointless for years. I have done a lot of them, like 2,000 episodes. I watch it now and I can play along. Before, I always wondered why people liked it, but I had all the answers written down. “I like to see if Zander likes his co-host. I can always tell as I know him very, very well. I can tell exactly what he thinks about his co-host at any given time.”
Richard is still a quizmaster for the daily BBC2 early evening show House of Games, on which celebrities tackle a range of wacky questions. “We record five shows a day,” he says. “It is not the most arduous day and the prizes are meaningless. I can hand out points wherever I like. It is always worth watching the one that goes out on a Thursday, as that is the one where everybody is at their weakest, me included. “The fourth one is the one to watch. If you are a good quizzer it is quite hard to not win. It is a fun show though. People always come back.”
House of Games was also the unlikely setting for romance for the host, who met his wife, former Doctor Who actress Ingrid Oliver when she was a contestant in 2020. They soon became close and fell in love during lockdown – before getting married in December 2022. Richard says: “I was doing a book event in Cheltenham recently and one of the questions was ‘who is your favourite ever contestant on House of Games?’ I was like ‘you do know I married one of them?I am not going to say Steve Pemberton!”
But, despite enjoying a diverse career, Richard is not about to follow Ingrid into acting. “I have tried to act and it is really hard. I can’t do it at all. I am so bad,” he says. “When I read with her, she does her bit and I am like an air traffic controller. and she tells me I don’t have to do the accent. We listen to it back and it is weird. How do people act? I had to play myself once on the sitcom Not Going Out. That should be easy, but it was even harder. I was even playing myself on Pointless. Sometimes I see newsreaders and I think they would make great actors, but nobody has ever said that to me.”
One certainty is that Richard will remain on TV and his books will be on our shelves for the foreseeable future. Well known for his openness regarding health problems, like an eye disorder called Nystagmus and his ongoing battle with food addiction, Richard confesses he has no desire to live forever – and thinks those who do are odd. He says: “All these people who want to live until they are 150. That seems weird to me.
“Like Putin and (Chinese President) Xi Jinping. They are obsessed with getting their organs and blood replaced. Like what is it they enjoy about life where they say ‘I can do another 75 years of this?’ A lot of them are planning nuclear wars and that feels kinda counter productive. You can drink as many kale smoothies as you like, but as soon as a ballistic missile lands on the Kremlin…”
Speaking at a recording for a 2026 podcast episode with comic Richard Herring, he continues: “How old do I want to be? The average age is 87. I don’t know, maybe 91. As long as you can keep your brain active, so long as your brain is enjoying it…stick around, right? You see 23-year-olds having fillers and you think ‘where are you going to go at 49 or 55?’ If I have my knees replaced, I could stick around until I am 100.”
Since his fame has gone global, Richard has found himself having to hide from over eager fans – which can be difficult, considering his 6ft 7in stature. He laughs: “I tend to go into a cubicle if there is one free since I have become more recognisable. When you are tall people always “sneak a peek”. I would usually go and have some peace in a cubicle. But I guess everyone looks the same height to me…everyone looks 5ft 7. It is all about perspective innit? If I write my autobiography it’s going to be called “Perspective Innit”?
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