--- name: "Peter Orton" canonical: "https://film.one/person/peter-orton" fi1m_id: "peter-orton" imdb_id: "nm0651369" tmdb_id: 108249 roles: ["Director"] reviewed_on_fi1m: 1 average_as: "director" average_over: 1 updated: "2026-10-07T13:59:33.696095+00:00" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Peter Orton ## Identity Peter Orton - **Canonical:** https://film.one/person/peter-orton - **Type:** Person - **Fi1m ID:** peter-orton - **IMDb ID:** nm0651369 - **TMDB ID:** 108249 - **Same entity:** https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0651369/, https://www.themoviedb.org/person/108249 Director. ## Details - **Work:** Director - **Elsewhere:** https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0651369/, https://www.themoviedb.org/person/108249 ## Fi1m on Peter Orton > Peter Orton's job is to be invisible, and on *Harry Hill's TV Burp* he was invisible with real precision: Hill in a wide shot, a clip cut to the frame, back for the face. It is the kind of comedy direction nobody notices and plenty of people get wrong. The shot that matters in *Harry Hill's TV Burp* (2002) is not the clip. It is the cut back. A snippet of a soap or a cookery programme runs for exactly as long as it needs to, trimmed so that the pause lands where Hill wants it, and then we are in the studio again, wide, with Hill's face doing the rest. Peter Orton directed it like a live show, and nothing he did ever asked to be noticed. Clip, face, clip, face. For the better part of a decade that rhythm was one of the most dependable laughs on British television, and the direction was its metronome. Orton came to it from *Baddiel & Skinner Unplanned* (2000), an improvised chat show where the director's task is to keep up with two men who have not decided what they are about to say. He directed *TV Burp* from its 2001 pilot through most of its run, and since then he has worked almost entirely in multi-camera comedy: studio segments for *Taskmaster* (2016), dozens of episodes of *The Russell Howard Hour* (2017), and a string of live stand-up recordings including *Russell Howard: Recalibrate* (2017) and *Greg Davies: You Magnificent Beast* (2018), with Al Murray and Chris Ramsey among the others. Avalon Television is the common thread. Russell Howard is the longest collaboration. There is a kind of direction that consists of not getting in the way, and it is harder than it sounds. A stand-up recording lives on whether the camera is on the comedian when the line lands and on the audience just after, and on resisting the urge to cut on every laugh. On *TV Burp* the same discipline is in the clips. The care was all upstream, in the choosing and the trimming, so that by the time Hill reacted the joke was half told already. We laughed harder than we expected at a programme about a week of telly twenty years gone, and most of the credit is Hill's, who plainly watched these programmes with something like affection; but the clips were cut by someone who knew a joke about a soap only works if the pause is exact. We have looked closely at one of his programmes, and it is the one where his contribution is easiest to see, because the joke was in the editing. The stand-up specials we have not reviewed, and we will not pretend to know whether Davies or Howard got something from Orton that another director with a camera plan and a steady hand would not have given them. What we can say is that the comedians keep going back to him, which is how reputations in his line are made: quietly, by people who would rather you did not notice. If you want to see what he does, watch *TV Burp* and watch where the cuts fall. If you cannot see them, that is the point. ## Biography Peter Orton is a British television director and producer specialising in comedy programmes. He directed episodes of *Harry Hill's TV Burp* from its pilot in 2001 through to 2010. His other directing credits include *Baddiel & Skinner Unplanned* (2000–2003), *Unspun with Matt Forde* (2016–2018), *The Russell Howard Hour* (2017–2020) and *The Chris and Rosie Ramsey Show* (2022–2023). He has also directed stand-up specials such as *Greg Davies: You Magnificent Beast* (2018) and *Russell Howard: Recalibrate* (2017), as well as live shows for comedians including Al Murray and Chris Ramsey. Orton is noted on IMDb as distinct from the children's television producer of the same name who died in 2007. *Sources: imdb.com, comedy.co.uk, watch.plex.tv.* ## On Fi1m (1) - *Harry Hill's TV Burp* (2002), Fi1m 81, Director — [page](https://film.one/tv/harry-hills-tv-burp.md) ## Complete filmography (38) Every credit, newest first. Titles without a page can be requested for review on the HTML page. - *Ania Magliano: I Can't Believe You've Done This* (2025), Director - *Russell Howard: Live at the London Palladium* (2025), Director - *Chris Ramsey: Live from London* (2024), Director - *Ahir Shah: Ends* (2024), Director - *John Kearns: The Varnishing Days* (2024), Director - *Ahir Shah: Dots* (2021), Director - *Jayde Adams: Serious Black Jumper* (2020), Director - *Chris Ramsey: The Just Happy To Get Out Of The House Tour* (2019), Director - *The Horne Section Television Programme* (2018), Director - *Greg Davies: You Magnificent Beast* (2018), Director - *Russell Howard: Recalibrate* (2017), Director - *Chris Ramsey Live: All Growed Up* (2015), Director - *Russell Howard: Wonderbox* (2014), Director - *Al Murray, The Pub Landlord: The Only Way Is Epic* (2012), Director - *Al Murray, The Pub Landlord: Barrel of Fun Live* (2010), Director - *Russell Howard's Good News* (2010), Director - *Harry Hill's TV Burp Gold 3* (2010), Director - *Harry Hill's TV Burp Gold 3* (2010), Director - *Russell Howard Live: Dingledodies* (2009), Director - *Harry Hill's TV Burp Gold 2* (2009), Director - *Russell Howard: Live* (2008), Director - *Harry Hill's TV Burp Gold* (2008), Director - *Al Murray, The Pub Landlord - Live At The Palladium* (2007), Director - *Harry Hill: in 'Hooves'* (2005), Director - *Harry Hill: The Way it Is - The Making of 'Hooves'* (2005), Director, Camera Operator - *Stewart Lee: Stand-Up Comedian* (2005), Director - *An Audience with Al Murray* (2005), Director - *Jerry Springer: The Opera* (2005), Director - *Baddiel & Skinner's Fantasy Football* (2004), Director - *An Audience with Harry Hill* (2004), Director - *Harry Hill's TV Burp* (2002), series, Director — Fi1m 81, [page](https://film.one/tv/harry-hills-tv-burp.md) - *Harry Hill: Man Alive* (1997), Director - *The Boy with the Big Face* (1997), Director - *Frank Skinner Live at the London Palladium* (1996), Director - *Harry Hill Live* (1995), Director - *The Scandal Story* (1989), Writer, Director - *U.K. Subs - Live From London At The Camden Palace Theatre* (1985), Director - *The New Lords of the Isles* (1981), Editor --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/person/peter-orton