Dara Ó Briain
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Dara started his career in University College, Dublin, where he did a degree in Mathematical Physics. While a student there, he was both the auditor of the famous L&H, the Literary and Historical Debating society, and the co-editor and co-founder of the University Observer college newspaper. In 1994 he was The Irish Times national debating champion in both the English and Irish languages.
After leaving college he began his television career as a children's presenter on RTÉ whilst performing his first stand-up gigs on the Irish comedy circuit. He spent three years as a presenter on the bilingual (Irish and English) children's programme Echo Island but came to prominence as a team captain on the topical panel show Don't Feed The Gondolas (1998-2000) hosted by Sean Moncrieff. He left the show midway through its fifth season in order to perform at the Adelaide and Melbourne comedy festivals.
Ó Briain's stand up career internationally took off around this time as he began to tour heavily, performing across the continents in Europe, Asia, Australia, with gigs as far afield as Dubai, Boston, Adelaide, Shanghai and New York. He became a regular at the Edinburgh Festival and as well as making one notable appearance at the Just For Laughs festival in Montreal in 2002 where he was offered a prestigious gala show because of his performances at the Irish showcase.
Around this time Dara presented the weekend mainstream game show It's a Family Affair for RTÉ, but it was not seen as a good fit for the performer. It was, however, the first time he worked with former Channel 4 commissioning editor Seamus Cassidy. They later set up the production company Happy Endings Productions, and together they produced (and Dara presented)the chat show Buried Alive (2003) and most famously in Ireland The Panel (2003-onwards).
The Panel is a Australian television programme originally produced by Working Dog Productions. The Irish version, hosted by Dara, has become one of the most talked about shows in Ireland. Twice nominated for the Best Entertainment show IFTA (Irish Film and Televison Award) the show has a rotating cast of panellists, usually drawn from the world of Irish comedy, discussing the events of the week and interviewing guests. The most regular panellists have been Colin Murphy, Ed Byrne, Neil Delamere and Andrew Maxwell. Happy Endings Productions have also produced Miriam O'Callaghan's summer chat show, Miriam (2005) and co-produced The Podge and Rodge Show (2006)
From 2002 on, with his profile rising in the UK due to his one man shows at the Edinburgh fringe festival, Dara began to start making appearances on UK television shows such as Bring Me The Head of Light Entertainment (a Channel 5 production) and Never Mind The Buzzcocks. His big break in UK television came in 2003 when he became host of BBC2's Live Floor Show a showcase for fellow stand up comics which brought him to the attention of a wider mainstream audience. This was led to an appearance as guest and, ultimately, four appearances as guest host of the popular news quiz, Have I Got News For You.
By this stage he had moved to the UK and was working on the British circuit full-time. He sold out the entire run in Edinburgh in 2002, a feat he was to repeat for the next three years. In fact, in 2003 he was deemed "too big" for the Perrier award and eliminated from the competition. He remains one of the few high-profile stand-ups in the UK never to have been even nominated for the award. He was nonetheless invited by organisers of the Perrier to perform at their Best of the Edinburgh Festival run in Her Majesty's Theatre in London's west End in 2003. He was nominated in 2003 at the Chortle Comedy Awards for Live Comedy in the categories Best Compère and Best Headline Act (which he would go on to win). In 2004 he won the Best Headliner award again, as well as being nominated for Best Full-length Show.
Currently he can be seen hosting the comedy panel game Mock the Week on BBC television, a blend between Have I Got News For You and Whose Line is it Anyway?. Other notable televison work includes fronting the BBC sitcom writing competition "Last Laugh" and 2 documentaries re-creating the legendary British comedy novel "Three Men in a Boat", where he rowed down the Thames with Griff Rhys Jones and Rory McGrath, also for the BBC.
In August of 2005, he returned to the Edinburgh Festival for the eighth consecutive time, for a run at the Assembly Rooms which was the biggest selling solo comedy show of the festival.
On 14 September 2005, he appeared as a guest on Room 101, where he got rid of children's television presenters (originating from his co-presenters on Echo Island) once-in-a-lifetime experiences (he was given a once-in-a-lifetime experience on the show, by being the first guest ever to pull the lever that opens the chute to Room 101), banter, Gillian McKeith (host of You Are What You Eat) and magicians.
In early 2006, he conducted his third and largest national tour of the United Kingdom and Ireland. This included 49 shows in Cities and Towns such as London, Manchester, Birmingham, Glasgow and Belfast as well as 9 nights sold out in Dublin. His second night in The Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in London was recorded for his first live DVD, to be released later in 2006.
The comedian has also been an extensive newspaper columnist, with pieces published in many national papers in both the UK and Ireland, from the Sunday Times to the Daily Telegraph.
He now lives in London.
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