Editing Stephen Merchant (section)

==Early life and education ==
{{Quote box|width=27%|align=right|quote="I don't remember where I got this grand idea that I could somehow be [[John Cleese]]. That was my overriding passion from my mid-teens. John Cleese had grown up in [[Weston-super-Mare]], not far from Bristol, where I grew up, and he was tall and he was very funny and very British and it's almost like I thought, 'Well if they want tall people from the [[West Country]], I can do that.'"|source=—Merchant in December 2019<ref name=cleese>{{cite news |title=Stephen Merchant recalls creating The Office with Ricky Gervais |url=https://www.irishnews.com/magazine/entertainment/2019/12/22/news/stephen-merchant-recalls-creating-the-office-with-ricky-gervais-1797154/ |access-date=29 June 2020 |work=Irish News}}</ref>}}
Stephen James Merchant was born in the [[Hanham]] suburb of [[Bristol]]<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/whats-on/whats-on-news/stephen-merchant-shoot-new-bbc-3722158|title = Stephen Merchant to shoot major new series in Bristol|date = 10 January 2020}}</ref> on 24 November 1974,<ref name=":1" /> the son of nursery nurse Jane Elaine (née Hibbs) and plumber and builder Ronald John Merchant.<ref>[https://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/main.jhtml?view=DETAILS&grid=&xml=/education/2007/08/18/fafamdet118.xml Family detective: Stephen Merchant], Telegraph.co.uk; accessed 8 March 2015.</ref> He attended [[Hanham high school|Hanham Secondary School]]<ref>"[http://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/bristol-news/11-bristol-celebrities-go-school-17024 Where did these 11 Bristol celebrities go to school?]", ''Bristol Post'', 2 April 2017 (Accessed 4 April 2017)</ref> and later the [[University of Warwick]] in [[Coventry]] from 1993 to 1996, where he graduated with a [[Bachelor of Arts|BA]] in Film and Literature with a [[2:1]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://cambridge.tab.co.uk/2011/06/08/10-questions-stephen-merchant/|title=10 Questions: Stephen Merchant|first=Holly|last=Stevenson|work=The Tab|date=8 June 2011|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140221083727/http://cambridge.tab.co.uk/2011/06/08/10-questions-stephen-merchant/|archive-date=21 February 2014|df=dmy-all}}</ref> He worked as a film reviewer on the student radio station [[Radio Warwick]], where he began his broadcasting career.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/alumni/ouralumni/notable2/merchant|title=Funny you asked|publisher=University of Warwick website}}</ref> His group there included film critic [[James King (film critic)|James King]]. A number of tapes of ''The Steve Show'' were rediscovered and have been published on various Merchant fan sites.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://steveshow.wordpress.com/ |title=The Steve Show |publisher=Steveshow.wordpress.com |access-date=23 January 2012}}</ref>

Merchant was inspired to get into comedy by [[John Cleese]].<ref name=cleese /> In 2019, he said that he had never met Cleese, but that his parents had recently met him on a cruise and asked him to sign a book for Merchant; they also recorded a voicemail message on the phone in their cabin, which consisted of Cleese saying: "Hello there, Mr and Mrs Merchant, I'd be more than happy to sign your book. I was just wondering is your Stephen Merchant the same Stephen Merchant who collaborated with [[Ricky Gervais]] on ''[[The Office (British TV series)|The Office]]''? Because I'm an enormous fan and please pass on my best regards." On hearing this, Merchant said, "I don't feel I need to meet him now. That's all I needed."<ref>{{cite news |title=10 things we learned from Stephen Merchant's Desert Island Discs |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/BB2zfXKVYyXVnyMwR2GLnR/10-things-we-learned-from-stephen-merchants-desert-island-discs |access-date=29 June 2020 |agency=BBC}}</ref>