Rik Mayall. Photo: PA Wire

Comedian and actor Rik Mayall has died at home aged 56, his management firm said. It is believed the star’s wife found him at home in London yesterday in the morning.

Mayall, who shot to fame playing Rick in The Young Ones, had survived an almost fatal accident more than 10 years ago when a quad bike accident left him in a coma for several days. His career included appearances in shows including Black-adder, Bottom and The New Statesman where he played the conniving Conservative MP Alan B’Stard.

Among those paying tribute to Mayall, who was married with three children, was David Walliams, who said: “I am heartbroken that my comedy idol growing up, Rik Mayall, has died. He made me want to be a comedian.”

A Scotland Yard spokesman said officers were called by London Ambulance Service to a house in Barnes, south-west London at around 1.20pm where “a man, aged in his 50s, was pronounced dead at the scene”.

The death is not believed to be suspicious, he added.

Paying tribute, Blackadder producer John Lloyd said Mayall was “just extraordinary”.

Speaking to BBC News, he said: “It’s really a dreadful piece of news. I remember going to the very first night of the Comedy Store and thinking ‘Where does this come from?’.

“It was the most extraordinary thing, him and Ade Edmondson doing the Dangerous Brothers, they were called, and you just felt you were in the presence of something, a whole revolutionary thing.”

Speaking about the 1998 accident that nearly killed him, Mayall said doctors had kept him alive on a life-support machine for five days and were about to turn it off when he began to show signs of life. He used to mark the occasion by exchanging presents with his wife and children and said the near-death experience changed his life.

He said: “The main difference between now and before my accident is I’m just very glad to be alive.

“Other people get moody in their forties and fifties – men get the male menopause. I missed the whole thing. I was just really happy.”