Richard Thomas

Richard Thomas (born 1964) is British a musician, writer, and comedy actor. He is best known for composing and scoring the award-winning Jerry Springer: The Opera with Stewart Lee. Thomas collected the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Musical Score in 2004.

Richard Thomas's comedy career began in 1987, doing a musical act on keyboards. In 2000, he wrote and performed a one-act opera called Tourette’s Diva with four actors, which aired at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Thomas had the idea for an opera based on Jerry Springer at this time, and wrote it over the next two years, chiefly in workshops at Battersea Arts Centre. Thomas would offer a "Beer for an Idea", where any audience members submitting a good idea would be rewarded with a can of Foster's (and poor ideas with a supermarket store brand).