Matt Berry is having an American moment with What We Do in the Shadows, Year of the Rabbit and Disenchantment

Los Angeles Times

The 45-year-old British comic actor and sometimes musician is a known commodity in the U.K. with Toast of London and The IT Crowd. Now he's back on American TV with IFC British comedy Year of the Rabbit, in which he plays Detective Inspector Eli Rabbit, an earthy, foul, drunk, brutal character he created. Writers Andy Riley and Kevin Cecil were enlisted “to do the murder mystery part that I was less interested in," Berry says. He adds of his show, which has been called a Victorian riff on Brooklyn Nine-Nine: “I wanted to play it mostly straight but have the situations to be kind of preposterous and the comedy come from there for a change,” says Berry, “instead of a gargoyle of a character that’s larger than life, ’cause I’d done that.” ALSO: Berry's luscious baritone and intricate wordplay can sometimes mask his talents as a rubber-faced physical marvel.