Jo Brand
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| Jo Brand | |
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| Jo Brand at the BBC Magazines Awards for Excellence | |
| Birth name | Josephine Grace Brand |
| Born | 3 May 1957 Hastings, East Sussex, United Kingdom |
| Medium | Stand-up Television |
| Nationality | British |
| Years active | 1986–present |
| Spouse | Bernie Bourke |
Josephine "Jo" Grace Brand[1] (born 3 May 1957 in Hastings, East Sussex) is a British stand-up comedian.
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[edit] Career
Brand's mother was a social worker, and Brand herself worked as a psychiatric nurse at the South London Bethlem and Maudsley Hospital until the mid-1980s.[2] She was persuaded by agent Malcolm Hardee to begin a career in stand-up comedy, where she acquired the stage name, "The Sea Monster". She was central to the British alternative comedy movement, working London alternative comedy clubs, and appearing initially on the Saturday Live television show.
Brand's early style involved her delivering jokes in a bored monotone, one line at a time, with pauses in between. It drew heavily from pop culture and the media, with many jokes containing references to well-known celebrities and public figures. With her Doc Marten boots, her large size and short hair, her image (and comedic material) for most of the 1980s and 1990s was inspired at least in part by radicalised feminism. But most of the apparently feminist material was in the set-up of the jokes, and was punctured by the punchline. Her appearance and material led to rumours that she was a lesbian: this is not in fact the case.[3] She has commented that "men are fantastic – as a concept". She has also said satirically that she was reading in the newspapers that she was a lesbian for so long, she started to believe it. She was for a while romantically involved with Malcolm Hardee, who had initially persuaded her to become a comedian.
In 1993 she became a resident panellist, along with Tony Hawks, on BBC monologue show The Brain Drain. Her transition into mainstream television continued when she obtained her own series on Channel 4, Jo Brand Through the Cakehole, co-written with comedy writer Jim Miller, who was already her main stand-up writer. Her television success continued with guest appearances on shows such as Have I Got News For You and QI. She has had several solo television series, and presented shows such as Jo Brand's Commercial Breakdown. She also appeared on Star Spell, a spin off from Hard Spell, during 2004, and in cameo in Absolutely Fabulous. As a fan of Countdown, she achieved an ambition when she was invited to appear in the show's "Dictionary Corner" as the celebrity guest. She later became a friend of the host, Richard Whiteley, and after his death in 2005 attended his memorial service at York Minster. She has since appeared on Countdown several more times.
In 2007, Brand narrated Laughter & Tears: The Les Dawson Story, a documentary tribute to Les Dawson. The programme was broadcast on BBC Radio 2 in October 2007.
Brand took part in the first celebrity version of Comic Relief does Fame Academy. In 2007, she appeared as a celebrity contestant on Comic Relief Does The Apprentice, again to raise money for Comic Relief. In 2009 she participated in Let's Dance for Comic Relief, another Comic Relief fundraiser, dancing as Britney Spears, reaching the final.
Brand appeared as a judge in the BBC2 series The Speaker in April 2009. She offered her advice, along with with John Amaechi and Jeremy Stockwell, in the eight-part series charting the search for "Britain's Best Young Speaker".[4].
[edit] Other work
Brand delivered a guest lecture on the subject of psychiatric nursing for the University of Derby Psychology Society in 1997 in return for a donation to Derby Rape Crisis.
In 2003, she was listed in The Observer as one of the 50 funniest acts in British comedy. In 2004, Brand appeared in a special episode of What Not to Wear, where fashion gurus Trinny Woodall and Susannah Constantine gave her a makeover. In March 2006, Jo appeared on Parkinson with Daniel Day-Lewis and Jane Fonda. Brand is known to be a big fan of Crystal Palace Football Club, and has sponsored the matchball for games in the past[citation needed].
Brand appeared on the 25 March 2007 episode of Play It Again where she was required to learn how to play the organ in just four months. This was in preparation to perform Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D Minor for an audience of 8,000 people at London's Royal Albert Hall on the second largest pipe organ in the United Kingdom. In order to practise her performance, she played at a church wedding, and accompanied dancers at Blackpool Tower. Prior to this, her only experiences with musical instruments had been childhood piano and violin lessons.[5]
In February 2009 Brand was among a group of British entertainers who wrote an open letter to The Times of London in support of the Bahá'í leaders then on trial in Iran.[6]
[edit] Personal life
Brand was educated at Helenswood School, Hastings, Tunbridge Wells Girls' Grammar School and Bexhill College. She married Bernie Bourke in 1997.
She is a staunch supporter of the Labour Party[7] and Republic, a campaign to establish an elected Head of State in the UK and abolish the Monarchy.
[edit] Quotations
- April 2006, film for BBC One's This Week - "Patricia Hewitt heckled by the very mild-mannered RCN. The last time they got that riled was when Florence Nightingale ate all the Jammie Dodgers at the Christmas party. You can heckle all you like, but getting Patricia Hewitt out of her job isn't going to bring a magic cure."[8]
- Upon reaching the French oral exam during her appearance on the BBC television series School's Out!, Jo Brand started off with "Guten Tag! Sprechen Sie Deutsch?", and then proceeded to call the examiner, in French, a "very scary cow", much to the examiner's displeasure. She also claimed to have 21 children, two of whom were named "Del Boy" and "a Gorilla". When asked if she cooked, she replied, again in French, "No, I eat! I eat a horse from time to time! I eat the entire set..." She received a score of 6 out of 20.
[edit] References
- ^ biograpy of Jo Brand, QI website, (viewed 9 July 2009)
- ^ Rob Brydon's Annually Retentive, BBC website
- ^ "Jo Brand is one funny woman", BBC interview, 26 October 2005 (viewed 9 July 2009)
- ^ Fighting the Fear, The Speaker, BBC Television
- ^ Play it Again BBC Television
- ^ "Stand up for Iran’s Baha’is" Open letter to The Times, 26 February 2009 (viewed 9 July 2009)
- ^ "Political celebrities" Politics.co.uk, 1 September 2008 (viewed 9 July 2009)
- ^ Jo Brand quote, BBC website (viewed 9 July 2009)
[edit] External links
- Jo Brand at the Internet Movie Database
- '20 questions with...Jo Brand' Interview by Tom Atkins for 'What's on Stage?', 25 February 2008.
- 'Jo Brand: Me? Singing? I couldn't get arrested? Interview by Jasper Rees, The Telegraph, 30 January 2008.
- "Jo Brand: a Kentish maid" by Jo Geear, BBC Kent website, 23 August 2005
- 'Keep on running: Jo Brand' Interview by Tarquin Cooper, The Telegraph, 9 April 2005.
- 'Kicking off the bovver boots' by Sally Vincent, The Guardian, 8 May 2004
- Article about Brand's career for TV show The Speaker, BBC website
