Maff Brown
Encyclopedia
Maff Brown is a British comedian
Comedian
A comedian or comic is a person who seeks to entertain an audience, primarily by making them laugh. This might be through jokes or amusing situations, or acting a fool, as in slapstick, or employing prop comedy...
and MC who is known for his mischievous style of joke-telling and is the founder of the award-winning Outside The Box Comedy Club
Outside The Box Comedy Club
Outside the Box is a comedy club located in the backroom of The Fighting Cocks pub in Kingston-upon-Thames. It was opened in November 2006 by comedian Maff Brown....
.
Football
During his high schoolHigh school
High school is a term used in parts of the English speaking world to describe institutions which provide all or part of secondary education. The term is often incorporated into the name of such institutions....
education he began playing football
Football (soccer)
Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a sport played between two teams of eleven players with a spherical ball...
, a passion which was recognized as a talent when he was chosen to play right back and central midfielder for Brentford F.C.
Brentford F.C.
Brentford Football Club are a professional English football club based in Brentford in the London Borough of Hounslow. They are currently playing in Football League One....
and Hamilton Academical
Hamilton Academical F.C.
Hamilton Academical Football Club, often known as Hamilton Academical, or Accies, are a Scottish football club from Hamilton in South Lanarkshire. They were established in 1874 from the school football team at Hamilton Academy. They remain the only professional club in British football to have...
. At 20 years old his playing career was cruelly cut short when a broken ankle failed to heal correctly. He went on the coach at the Centre of Excellence at Brentford
Brentford F.C.
Brentford Football Club are a professional English football club based in Brentford in the London Borough of Hounslow. They are currently playing in Football League One....
, the Bolton Wanderers
Bolton Wanderers F.C.
Bolton Wanderers Football Club is an English professional association football club based in the area of Horwich in the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, Greater Manchester. They began their current spell in the Premier League in 2001....
Academy, the Everton
Everton F.C.
Everton Football Club are an English professional association football club from the city of Liverpool. The club competes in the Premier League, the highest level of English football...
Academy. After graduating from Liverpool John Moores University
Liverpool John Moores University
Liverpool John Moores University is a British 'modern' university located in the city of Liverpool, England. The university is named after John Moores and was previously called Liverpool Mechanics' School of Arts and later Liverpool Polytechnic before gaining university status in 1992, thus...
, he was hired by Gerrard Houllier's team at Liverpool F.C.
Liverpool F.C.
Liverpool Football Club is an English Premier League football club based in Liverpool, Merseyside. Liverpool has won eighteen League titles, second most in English football, seven FA Cups and a record seven League Cups...
as a technical analyst. After leaving Liverpool he was offered a coaching position in Singapore
Singapore
Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...
for Woodlands Wellington. Two seasons later, after losing two games which were shown on television, Brown was paid off. "They wanted me to make a public apology. I refused. You lose games in football. That's life."
Stand-up comedy
In May 2005 he completed the Amused Moose stand up comedy course run by fellow comedian Logan MurrayLogan Murray
Logan Murray is a London-based stand-up comedian.Murray has appeared on television shows such as 'Peep Show', 'Packet of Three', 'London Underground', 'Pebble Mill', 'The Pallbearer's Revue', Channel Four's 'History of Swearing', 'The Greatest ***** Show on TV', 'Jerriatrick', 'People Like Us' and...
, then began performing in November 2005. The day after he finished the course, Brown started plans to set up the now cult weekly Outside the Box Comedy Club
Outside The Box Comedy Club
Outside the Box is a comedy club located in the backroom of The Fighting Cocks pub in Kingston-upon-Thames. It was opened in November 2006 by comedian Maff Brown....
at the Fighting Cocks pub in Kingston
Kingston upon Thames
Kingston upon Thames is the principal settlement of the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames in southwest London. It was the ancient market town where Saxon kings were crowned and is now a suburb situated south west of Charing Cross. It is one of the major metropolitan centres identified in the...
. Three months after the club began, it was nominated and won the prestigious Best Comedy Club Award from the renowned website Chortle.co.uk. Two years on and it's reached cult status among big name comedians. Many of whom use the club to try out new material and most popularly, to test out their material pre-Edinburgh festival
Edinburgh Festival
The Edinburgh Festival is a collective term for many arts and cultural festivals that take place in Edinburgh, Scotland each summer, mostly in August...
. To date guests have included: Jimmy Carr
Jimmy Carr
James Anthony Patrick "Jimmy" Carr is an English-Irish comedian and humourist. He is known for his deadpan delivery and dark humour. He is also a writer, actor and presenter of radio and television....
, Frank Skinner
Frank Skinner
Frank Skinner is a British writer, comedian and actor. He is best known for his television presenting, often alongside David Baddiel, with whom he also collaborated for the football song "Three Lions."He is a radio presenter on the Saturday morning slot on Absolute Radio.-Youth and early career...
, Stephen Merchant
Stephen Merchant
Stephen James Merchant is an English writer, director, radio presenter, comedian, and actor. He is best known for his collaborations with Ricky Gervais, as the co-writer and co-director of the popular British sitcom The Office, as the co-writer, co-director and a co-star of Extras, and as the...
, Bill Bailey
Bill Bailey
Bill Bailey is an English comedian, musician and actor. As well as his extensive stand-up work, Bailey is well known for his appearances on Black Books, Never Mind the Buzzcocks, Have I Got News for You, and QI.Bailey was listed by The Observer as one of the 50 funniest acts in British comedy in...
, Lee Mack
Lee Mack
Lee Gordon McKillop is an English stand-up comedian and actor, known by the stage name Lee Mack. He is well known in the United Kingdom for writing and starring in the sitcom Not Going Out, for being a team captain on Would I Lie to You? and for hosting Lee Mack's All Star Cast.-Personal life:Mack...
, Sean Lock
Sean Lock
Sean Lock is an English comedian and actor. He began his comedy career as a stand-up comedian. He won the British Comedy Award in 2000 in the category of Best Live Comic, and was nominated for the Perrier Comedy Award. He is also well known for his appearances on television and radio...
, Russell Brand
Russell Brand
Russell Edward Brand is an English comedian, actor, columnist, singer, author and radio/television presenter.Brand achieved mainstream fame in the UK in 2004 for his role as host of Big Brother spin-off, Big Brother's Big Mouth. His first major film role was in the 2007 film St Trinians...
, Rich Hall
Rich Hall
Richard "Rich" Hall is an American comedian, writer and musician.-Early life and career:Hall was born in Alexandria, Virginia and grew up in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina. He is part Cherokee Indian...
, Omid Djalili
Omid Djalili
Omid Djalili is a British Iranian stand-up comedian, actor, television producer and writer.-Personal life:Djalili was born in Chelsea, London to Iranian Bahá'í parents and is a Bahá'í himself...
, Dara Ó Briain
Dara Ó Briain
Dara Ó Briain is an Irish stand-up comedian and television presenter, noted for hosting topical panel shows such as The Panel and Mock the Week....
, Andy Parsons
Andy Parsons
Andy Parsons is an English comedian and writer, who regularly appears on Mock the Week. With comedy partner Henry Naylor, he has written and presented nine seasons of Parsons and Naylor’s Pull-Out Sections for BBC Radio 2.-Early life:...
, Jo Brand
Jo Brand
Josephine Grace "Jo" Brand is a BAFTA winning British comedian, writer, and actor.- Early life :Jo Brand was born 23 July 1957 in Wandsworth, London. Her mother was a social worker. Brand is the middle of three children, with two brothers...
, Robin Ince
Robin Ince
Robin Ince is an English stand-up comedian, actor and writer. He is best known for presenting the BBC radio show The Infinite Monkey Cage .-Stand-up comedy:...
, Tim Vine
Tim Vine
Timothy "Tim" Mark Vine is an English actor, writer and comedian. He has released a number of DVDs of his stand-up comedy, as well as starring in the successful series Not Going Out with Lee Mack on the BBC...
, Russell Kane
Russell Kane
Russell Kane is an English writer, comedian, actor and media personality. In June 2006, he became the face of digital station Five US. He has been nominated for the Edinburgh Comedy Awards at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, winning the main prize in August 2010...
, Rhys Darby
Rhys Darby
Rhys Montague Darby is an actor and stand-up comedian from New Zealand, known for his energetic physical comedy routines, telling stories accompanied with mime and sound effects of things such as machinery and animals...
, Russell Howard
Russell Howard
Russell Joseph Howard is an English comedian best known for his TV show Russell Howard's Good News and his appearances on the topical panel TV show Mock The Week...
, Lenny Henry
Lenny Henry
Lenworth George "Lenny" Henry, is a British actor, writer, comedian and occasional television presenter.- Early life :...
and most notably Robin Williams
Robin Williams
Robin McLaurin Williams is an American actor and comedian. Rising to fame with his role as the alien Mork in the TV series Mork and Mindy, and later stand-up comedy work, Williams has performed in many feature films since 1980. He won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance...
.
Aside from MCing Outside The Box every Monday, Brown tours the UK comedy circuit developing his own material. March 2007 saw him tackle the comedy clubs in New York City. After landing three open spots, he took on Village Lantern in Greenwich Village
Greenwich Village
Greenwich Village, , , , .in New York often simply called "the Village", is a largely residential neighborhood on the west side of Lower Manhattan in New York City. A large majority of the district is home to upper middle class families...
and on to the Broadway Comedy Club with its three rooms. On the first night he was in the smallest one and was only supposed to do five minutes, but the MC told him to stay on. He did over 15 minutes and on the strength of that, got invited back the next day to play the next room up. The middle room at the Broadway Comedy Club holds around 80 people. Brown did 25 minutes and got a standing ovation.
Brown has had numerous gigs in London's Comedy Store, most popular were the charity fundraiser gigs for Macmillan Cancer Support
Macmillan Cancer Support
Macmillan Cancer Support is one of the largest British charities and provides specialist health care, information and financial support to people affected by cancer....
. These have been held on each September after his return from the Edinburgh festival. 2007 saw a successful gig with Brown hosting and the bill including Dara Ó Briain
Dara Ó Briain
Dara Ó Briain is an Irish stand-up comedian and television presenter, noted for hosting topical panel shows such as The Panel and Mock the Week....
, Russell Howard
Russell Howard
Russell Joseph Howard is an English comedian best known for his TV show Russell Howard's Good News and his appearances on the topical panel TV show Mock The Week...
and was headlined by Al Murray
Al Murray
Alastair James Hay "Al" Murray , is a British comedian best known for his stand-up persona, The Pub Landlord, a stereotypical xenophobic public house licensee. In 2003, he was listed in The Observer as one of the 50 funniest acts in British comedy...
.
2008 was a total sell out with The Independent heralding the evening as "A triumph!".
Edinburgh Festival
August 2007 saw a successful Edinburgh festivalEdinburgh Festival
The Edinburgh Festival is a collective term for many arts and cultural festivals that take place in Edinburgh, Scotland each summer, mostly in August...
stint for Brown when playing the white half in a show called The Honky
Honky
Honky is a racial slur for white people, predominantly heard in the United States...
and the Wog
Wog
Wog or Pog is a slang word with a number of meanings, generally considered derogatory and, in some instances, extremely offensive when used in relation to ethnicity...
. Sharing the bill as the black counterpart, was Paramount Comedy Channel's Nathan Caton. The both performed half an hour and received positive reviews as a result.
2008's Festival was spent in the Pleasance
Pleasance
The Pleasance is a street in the Old Town, Edinburgh, Scotland. It is largely residential, although the University of Edinburgh owns property in the area.-University of Edinburgh union:...
Cellar as part of the award-winning stand up show AAA. Paddy Lennox, Tom Craine and Maff shared the night and each showcased half an hour of their best material. It was a sell-out for the whole of the August run which, for the first time in the show's history, sold out every night.
2009's Edinburgh festival
Edinburgh Festival
The Edinburgh Festival is a collective term for many arts and cultural festivals that take place in Edinburgh, Scotland each summer, mostly in August...
saw Maff perform over three shows. Simon Donald and Maff Brown, a shared hour with Simon Donald
Simon Donald
Simon Donald is a co-founder and was co-editor of the British comic magazine Viz until 2003.He set up the magazine in 1979 with his brother Chris from a bedroom in Newcastle. His most famous creation for the magazine is probably Sid the Sexist....
co-founder of VIZ
Viz
Viz. and the adverb videlicet are used as synonyms for "namely", "that is to say", and "as follows".-Etymology:...
magazine. Half an hour alongside Simon Jenkins in the show Simon Jenkins Plus One. And as Philberto's show off brother Umberto in comedian Milo McCabe
Milo McCabe
Milo McCabe is a British television presenter and Stand-up character comedian.-Early Life:McCabe was born in Kingston upon Thames to Mike McCabe...
's show Philberto's Animal .
2010 saw Maff do his debut solo show Looking After Lesal in the Pleasance
In 2011 he returned to Edinburgh performing his second solo show entitled Pacman Is Actually Allergic To Ghosts and played the host character Buddy Brown in Milo McCabe
Milo McCabe
Milo McCabe is a British television presenter and Stand-up character comedian.-Early Life:McCabe was born in Kingston upon Thames to Mike McCabe...
's character led spoof chat show Get Brown!
Awards
- Chortle AwardsChortle AwardsThe Chortle awards were set up in 2002 by the comedy website Chortle to honour the best of established stand-up comics currently working in the UK....
2006 - Winner: Best Comedy Club - Chortle AwardsChortle AwardsThe Chortle awards were set up in 2002 by the comedy website Chortle to honour the best of established stand-up comics currently working in the UK....
2007 - Nominee: Best Comedy Club
Videography
- You Do The Maff (2008) Pilot episode with Stephen Merchant
- FSW with Maff Brown (2011) FSW - Episode 3
External links
- Official website: http://www.maffbrown.com
- Outside The Box Comedy Club: http://www.outsidetheboxcomedy.co.uk/
- Comedy C.V.: http://www.comedycv.co.uk/maffbrown/index.htm
- The Comedy Store Profile: http://www.thecomedystore.co.uk/whos_who_profile.php?id=442
- Time Out Interview: http://www.timeout.com/london/comedy/features/2772.html
- Your Local Guardian Interview: http://www.yourlocalguardian.co.uk/leisure/leisure/display.var.1803221.0.maffs_life_swap.php
- The Chortle Live Comedy Award Winners: http://www.chortle.co.uk/features_static/awards/chortle.php
- Chortle Listings for The Edinburgh 2008 AAA Show: http://www.chortle.co.uk/shows/edinburgh_fringe_2008/a/16078/aaa_stand-up_%5B2008%5D
- Comedy Store Review:
- http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/theatre-dance/reviews/you-write-the-reviews-benefit-for-macmillan-nurses-and-multiple-sclerosis-society-comedy-store-london-934036.html