Flying in the face of media female stereotyping and kicking Cosmopoliton in the bollocks in the process (and rightly so), Jo Brand, in all her unbounded (though possibly well supported) glory is my comedy heroine.
Foul mouthed, opinionated, and more caustic than a bottle of Domestos. Jo Brand’s unedited honesty and lack of inhibitions coupled with the driest of wit, all delivered with a tone of voice that gives you the impression that whatever she’s talking about she really couldn't give a flying fuck, and quite frankly she’d much rather be sat on her sofa at home, watching The Very Best of Loose Women on DVD, and eating…anything, as long as it’s within arms reach.
Quite probably she was the first woman I had seen do stand up, and surprisingly she made an indelible impression on me, she is in every sense of the word, unforgettable. Her complete nonchalance about her obesity (on her early comedy she refers to herself as The Sea Monster, A Fat Bastard and, amongst other things, compares her belly to K2 (that’s a mountain not a lovechild of K9)) and her distain for male chauvinism and, it seems, her general attire she got labeled a “Leso” by the media (*spits*), but like water off a whales vagina, she took it on all her chins and merely worked it into her comedy like it was all part of the plan. Indeed, rarely does a TV appearance of Jo, on chat shows and the like, go by without some reference to Lesbianism, and how her husband was surprised when he found out.I crave for moments of Jo Brand on those comedy quiz shows, she makes for such an entertaining panelist, QI, HIGNFY, Never Mind the Buzzcocks, she banters with the best of ‘em and gives as good, and quite often, better than she gets. All too often I cringe when females are on these shows and are dominated by their male counterparts and fail to keep up with the pace and drown into the background, almost to a point that you forget they’re actually there, to date, and to my knowledge, this has never happened to Jo Brand and I bet your bottom dollar it never will.
Few women choose the comedic career, few make it, and even fewer do “it” for me. Why this is I could speculate on for…oohh…let me see now….a whole of five minutes, at a push mind you. Let’s face it, it’s pretty plain as day, to me at least, why this is and not what some of you MIGHT think, women ARE funny, but stand-up comedy is a) dominated by men and b) not the wisest of career choices from a womens point of view (oops! whooper of a generalization there, do forgive me) and many “funny” women most probably (covering my back on this one) would opt for an alternative “route”. But, boy oh boy, am I glad Jo Brand didn’t.
Jo Brand doesn’t seem to have her own website and isn’t on facespace, mybook or Twatter, why am I not surprised? I can almost hear her saying “What a waste of fucking time that is”
Alas, she’s on the IMDB and here’s the Wikipedia link too:
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0104476/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jo_Brand
And a rather nice QI blog with a biography on Jo Brand
http://qitalk.blogspot.com/2007/09/biography-10-jo-brand.html
she is a legend :)
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