Roger Mellie

Roger Mellie ("The Man on the Telly") is a fictional character featured in Viz magazine. His catchphrase is "Hello, good evening and bollocks!", satirising David Frost's catchphrase "Hello, good evening, and welcome". The character (like many others in Viz) is foul-mouthed, an obnoxious misogynist who manages to maintain a career as a television presenter. He is shown working on various TV networks and channels, the fictional Fulchester Television (FTV) and the BBC being his primary employers. He is the ostensible author of Roger's Profanisaurus (ISBN 1-902212-05-3), a parody of Roget's Thesaurus.

Viz's founder and main contributor Chris Donald has said that the character of Roger Mellie was inspired by the off-screen behaviour of Rod Griffiths, a 1980s Northern UK regional TV presenter but that Mellie is actually nothing like Griffiths in fact and other presenters have been worked into the character, including Look North presenter Mike Neville. One issue gave Roger's name as "Roger Michael Neville Mellie".

Born Roger Edward Paul Mellie in 1937 in North Shields, Roger was educated at Fulchester Mixed Infants, Bartlepool Grammar School, and the Oxford Remand Centre. He began his broadcasting career as a cub reporter on the news with Robert Dougall and shot to fame doing genital mutilation routines at the London Palladium. Recruited by Fulchester Television he became a popular TV personality and established his own production company, MellieVision. He often stays at his favourite lap-dancing club until gone three in the morning but lives in Fulchester with his 17-year old Thai wife and 15 Staffordshire Bull Terriers. He has had five previous wives (two 'accidentally' murdered), is undischarged bankrupt, a hopeless alcoholic, extremely sexist, right-wing bigot and a recovering cocaine addict.

Roger's straight man is Tom, in early strips a director or producer, later a portmanteau figure, agent for Roger or television executive, to suit the script. In one issue, he has a sign reading 'Tom - Straight Man'. Tom's catchphrase is 'Where the Hell is Roger?'. Roger usually arrives announcing 'Sorry I'm late, Tom'. In one strip, Tom imagines Roger has arrived on time only to discover that it is a life-size cardboard cut-out. Roger and Tom have crossed over into the Billy the Fish strip occasionally before realising they are in the wrong page. They are used in other Viz strips when a reporter or narrator is needed and on these occasions Roger is generally (although not always) without his usual lecherous and/or violent behaviour.

On one occasion in 2006, while requiring a liver transplant (due to chronic alcoholism), Roger became a hit-and-run driver: he ran over and killed a motorcyclist without stopping, later receiving the dead man's liver for himself, then celebrating the successful liver transplant with a booze-up at the nearest pub. Sometimes the strip follows current or recent events: in a parody of the kidnapping of Alan Johnston, Roger is kidnapped in Beirut but after eight days it turns out to be an attempt to seek publicity. Tom discovers that the BBC is in on the deception and reluctantly takes part by being a fake phone-in contestant on BBC Radio 4. In 2011 (due to recent news stories revolving around celebrities taking out super injunctions in an attempt to protect themselves from scandal), Roger goes to his crooked solicitor attempting to silence his ex-wife from releasing a book about their violent marriage which also details Roger's 'questionable' hobbies. However it emerges he isn't trying to quiet his wife to protect himself, but is actually releasing this information himself in a new autobiography and he doesn't want her to cash in before him.

In another strip, Roger finally finds mainstream success by presenting Bargain Hunt only to have it ruined when a dead body is fished out of his swimming pool. He has also appeared in several other parodies of real TV shows, including a stint as presenter of Springwatch whilst Bill Oddie was in hospital (Roger had accidentally shot him). Roger's version of the show consisted of him launching live rabbits from a catapult for Jack Charlton and Ted Nugent to shoot. Usually Roger has little success hosting mainstream shows but often suggests pornographic reworkings of well-known shows which against all odds prove a success.

Roger enjoys opening supermarkets, swimming (in his 50K pool), Guinness, dog fighting, badger fighting, his favourite pub, and golf. His favourite newspaper is the News of the World, and his favourite TV show is 'UK Fanny Van' on Red Hot TV. He has also written several books, 'They Don't Call Me Roger For Nothing', 'Sorry I'm Late, Tom', 'Shit Yourself Slim', 'Roger Mellie's Ad Break', and 'Roger's Profanisaurus'.

An animated TV series was released on video tape and also broadcast on Channel 4 in 1991, with Peter Cook providing the voice of Roger, and Harry Enfield doing all of the other voices. Roger also appeared in the 1991 Viz video game as the commentator for all the races.