STEPHEN Fry has described his friendship with frequent collaborator Hugh Laurie as "an act of creative falling in love".
Speaking in an interview for BBC Two's Stephen Fry: A Life on Screen, to be broadcast tonight, the 58-year-old discusses his partnership with Laurie and speaks candidly about his mental health issues.
Fry rose to fame in the 1980s, establishing himself as a household name with BBC comedy show A Bit of Fry and Laurie, alongside his long-time partner.
"It was an act of creative falling in love. Comically falling in love. A genuine connection," he said of the successful partnership.
Laurie, who went on to acclaim in American drama series House, is one of several colleagues and friends offering insight into the popular screen personality.
"He had a tremendous sort of gravity even at that age of 20. He seemed like a 60-year-old at the age of 20," Laurie recalled.
"He wore tweed and I think stiff collars and smoked a pipe. I mean, ludicrously affected."
Best known for TV series including Blackadder and Jeeves and Wooster, Fry can currently be heard as the voice of Colonel K in the new CBBC series of Danger Mouse.
However, he has struggled with mental health issues and in 1995, quit the West End production of Cell Mates after telling colleagues he felt a failure as an actor.
He added: "When you feel you can't go on, it's not just a phase, it is a reality. I could not go on. And I would have killed myself if I didn't have the option of disappearing."
Just two years later, Fry was back on top in the 1997 film, Wilde.
"One of the greatest good fortunes I've had in my life was to be able to connect to the greatest heroes of my life - Oscar Wilde, who meant everything to me, who opened the doors of language to me and then, of course, made me examine the nature of my own sexuality and allowed me to be proud of it.
"He was an incredible man who never ceases to astonish me."
Stephen Fry: A Life on Screen, a Bafta Production, is broadcast on Tuesday December 29 at 9pm on BBC Two.
