Later career
In 2005, he took his first role in a television drama, a supporting part as a Venetian duke in the BBC historical serial Casanova, written by Russell T Davies. Also in 2005, he did voice work in the ITV children's program King Arthur's Disasters alongside Rik Mayall. Since 2006, Lucas has been the voice of the radio and television character Digit Al, devised as part of a public information campaign on digital switchover. On 26 November 2006 he appeared on the BBC Radio 4 programme Desert Island Discs. He made a cameo appearance in Shaun of the Dead as Tom, the cousin of Shaun's friend Yvonne.
In 2007, he released "(I'm Gonna Be) 500 Miles", originally by The Proclaimers, with Peter Kay as a charity single for Comic Relief. He performed the single as Little Britain character Andy Pipkin, along with Kay playing as Brian Potter. He also starred as Mr. Toad in The Wind in the Willows, a 2006 television adaptation of the Kenneth Grahame novel.
He has appeared in Kath & Kim and Neighbours (the latter alongside David Walliams as Little Britain characters Lou and Andy), as well as a cameo role, playing 'Chris' or 'Jammy' at the wedding fayre, in the BBC Three sitcom Gavin & Stacey. Lucas has co-written (with Walliams) and performed in a new series of Little Britain USA for HBO. Lucas was the first celebrity to appear in 2008's Big Brother Celebrity Hijack on E4.
On 9 April 2009, the series Kröd Mändoon and the Flaming Sword of Fire, featuring Lucas as a regular performer, premièred on Comedy Central, the first major comedy series which Lucas had worked on since Little Britain. In 2010, Lucas played Tweedledee and Tweedledum in Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland.
Starting in February 2010, Lucas began hosting his own radio show, And The Winner Is, in which he handed out a fictional series of awards based on nominations by his guests.
On 3 October 2010, Lucas played Monsieur Thénardier in the 25th Anniversary Concert of Les Misérables, at The O2 Arena in London for two performances. The following year from 23 June to 10 September 2011, he reprised the role at the Queen's Theatre, in the long-running West End production. He has since collaborated with Alfie Boe, who played Jean Valjean, to record a duet of "The Impossible Dream" on Boe's debut album.
Also in 2011, Lucas lent his voice to the CGI film Gnomeo and Juliet and he played a small role as the roommate of Kristen Wiig in the comedy Bridesmaids.
On Christmas Day 2010, the BBC premiered Lucas and David Walliams' latest series, Come Fly with Me. Unlike their previous work, Little Britain, this new show concentrated solely on the airline industry, with Walliams and Lucas each portraying several characters. In a BBC Three interview aired on 9 February 2011, it was revealed that the creators had considered including Carol Beer, the travel agent character from Little Britain. However, they chose not to include her to avoid the impression that Come Fly with Me was just a spinoff. Instead, they introduced an entirely fresh cast of characters.
On 28 March 2012, Lucas appeared as the "Generation X" guest on the Australian game show Talkin' 'Bout Your Generation. On 10 April 2012, Lucas's own BBC One show The Matt Lucas Awards began. It was a send-up of an awards program, with a panel of comedians giving their nominations for awards for a series of prizes concerning trivial topics.
Lucas also starred in the dark comedy Small Apartments released in February 2013 alongside James Caan, Billy Crystal, Johnny Knoxville, and Juno Temple with other cameo performances by notable actors. On 21 February 2013, Lucas appeared on the NBC series Community as Toby, an English friend of Abed Nadir. In 2014, Lucas played Ray Thomas in The Life of Rock with Brian Pern, as well as Joe the taxi driver in Paddington.
Lucas launched a new comedy series called Pompidou for BBC Two. The show began airing on 1 March 2015.
In May 2016, Lucas reprised his role as "Tweedledee/Tweedledum" in Tim Burton's Alice Through the Looking Glass, sequel to Alice in Wonderland. Lucas joined the BBC series Doctor Who for its tenth series, reprising the character Nardole, which he had previously played in the 2015 and 2016 Christmas specials, "The Husbands of River Song" and "The Return of Doctor Mysterio" respectively.
On 16 February 2017, Lucas was awarded an Honorary Degree "Doctor of Letters" by the University of Bristol, where he had studied for two years in the 1990s but had left before completing his degree course. On 3 October 2017, Lucas released his autobiography titled Little Me, published by Canongate Books in hardback. The paperback edition was released on 7 June 2018.
From 2 July to 25 August 2018, Lucas played Bill Snibson in a revival of Me and My Girl at Chichester Festival Theatre.
In January 2019, Lucas starred in a Netflix film titled Polar. In April, he voiced a character called Charlie in the family animated film The Queen's Corgi, and also voiced Mr Collick in Missing Link.
In 2019, Lucas was the bank holiday cover host for the Radio 2 Breakfast Show. He also covered Paul O'Grady's Sunday 5–7pm show during that summer. Fearne Cotton was the main breakfast show holiday cover host.
In 2021, Lucas continued to sit in for Zoe Ball and host the Radio 2 Breakfast Show.
From 10 August to 30 November 2019, Lucas returned to playing Monsieur Thénardier in Les Misérables: The All-Star Staged Concert at the Gielgud Theatre in London's West End. On 20 December 2019, Lucas returned to the role at the Sondheim Theatre (previously the Queen's Theatre), after actor Gerard Carey contracted vocal damage through pneumonia and was forced to pull out. On 10 January 2020, Lucas himself was forced to withdraw from the show following a back injury. On 5 December 2020, Lucas returned again to the role for The All-Star Staged Concert which returned to the Sondheim Theatre to a socially-distant audience during the COVID-19 pandemic. The concert was due to run until 31 January 2021, however due to the government's guidelines, the production closed early on 15 December.
In March 2020, he became the new co-host of the Channel 4 and Love Productions television show The Great British Bake Off, taking over from Sandi Toksvig. He departed from the programme in December 2022.
On 3 April 2020, Lucas released a reworked version of his "Baked Potato Song" from Shooting Stars titled "Thank You Baked Potato", with all proceeds from the track going towards the Feed NHS campaign, which aims to provide meals for NHS workers in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic in the UK. The song reached No. 34 in the charts. Lucas also wrote a children's picture book based on "Thank You, Baked Potato", published by Egmont and from which all proceeds again went to Feed NHS.
In 2020, Lucas, along with his Little Britain co-star David Walliams, apologised for their portrayal of characters using racial caricatures, "including an obese Caribbean woman called Desiree DeVere, portrayed in blackface, and a 'portly Thai bride' called Ting Tong." This was prompted after Netflix and BBC iPlayer removed the show from their catalogues.
In 2023, Lucas returned to Hollywood to star in the musical fantasy film Wonka, as one of the main antagonists, Gerald Prodnose. That year he also wrote a children's book titled The Boy Who Slept Through Christmas.
In 2024, he played a minor role in the historic epic action film Gladiator II as the Master of ceremonies. It serves as a sequel to Gladiator, which was released in 2000. He later revealed that he landed the role after his agent asked him to put in a tape, and he filmed it 80 times before sending it to the producers. He has said that he took inspiration for the character from David Hemmings in the original film, as well as Stanley Tucci in The Hunger Games.
In February 2025, Lucas reunited with David Walliams to present a twice weekly podcast entitled Making a Scene.. In each episode they interview a different personality and discuss how their life would be portrayed in a biopic.
In 2025 and 2026, Lucas returned again to the role of Monsieur Thénardier in Les Misérables: The Arena Concert Spectacular touring selected dates across the UK, Sweden, Ireland, Australia and Netherlands finishing at the Royal Albert Hall in London and Radio City Music Hall in New York City.
In September 2026, Lucas will play Fagin in the West End revival of Oliver! for 6 weeks only at the Gielgud Theatre (temporarily covering for Simon Lipkin).
