Stephen Fry discusses free speech
Stephen Fry was admittedly left taken aback when he learned that his prison cellmate was illiterate.
The 65-year-old English actor spent four months in prison whilst on remand when he was 17.
The actor and broadcaster was sent to prison after stealing a credit card and “embarking on a countrywide spending spree”.
Speaking in a new interview with Radio Times, Stephen said he shared his cell with a “young Welsh man” who to his own disbelief was “illiterate”
He said: “I started to teach him to read and write, and that was an extraordinary experience. I was known as ‘the Professor’ in prison.”
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The writer also discussed his sexuality and shared that after reading The Trials of Oscar Wilde by H Montgomery Hyde, he realised he was gay.
The broadcaster admitted: “As I read, I started to gasp and pant and feel simultaneously triumphant and terribly, terribly worried. I suddenly understood this extraordinary man and that his nature was the same as mine. As soon as I read that, I knew that I was gay.”
Despite his prison stint as a teenager, Stephen has enjoyed an impressive career and went on to become a writer, actor, comedian and director, with his credits including Blackadder and the film series adaptation of The Hobbit.
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In an interview with Dragons’ Den star Steven Bartlett on his Diary of a CEO podcast he candidly spoke about his childhood.
Stephen shared: “I was a deeply difficult child that my parents took me to a psychiatrist when I was 14.
“That started my journey into my mental health.”
“I started doing weird things,” the actor explained. “I was sent to prison, so the best I could do after a disastrous childhood, I decided, was now concentrate on getting into Cambridge.”
“That changed everything. I want to please people. And if I don’t please them, I get upset. I’ve done it wrong.”
The broadcaster said much of his disruptive behaviour as a teenager was explained later in his life by his bipolar disorder – when he was diagnosed at 37.
You can read the full interview in this week’s Radio Times out now.
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