Always Be Comedy: The Tommyfield pub, Kennington, London, 2017
Always Be Comedy: The Tommyfield pub, Kennington, London, 2018
Jen Brister: Meaningless: Monkey Barrel Comedy Club, Edinburgh, 2018
The Big Funny Fest: The Old Deer Park, Richmond, 2019
Always Be Comedy: The Tommyfield pub, Kennington, London, 2019
Jen Brister: Under Privilege: Monkey Barrel Comedy Club, Edinburgh, 2019
The Bike Project’s Wheelie Fun Charity Quiz: Online: 2020
Vix Leyton’s Comedy Roulette: Online: 2020
Always Be Comedy Online (2 shows): Online: 2020
Next Up Comedy Festival: Online: 2020
The Greenwich Comedy Festival 2020: Greenwich Park, London, 2020
Always Be Comedy: The Tommyfield pub, Kennington, London, 2020
The Return of The Craic Online Comedy Club: Online: 2021
Always Be Comedy Online: An Evening with Jen Brister: Online: 2021
Always Be Comedy Online: Kerry Godliman Allstars: Online: 2021
Funny That Comedy Summer Festival: Brighton Open Air Theatre, Brighton, 2021
London Comedy Allstars: London Wonderground, Earls Court, London, 2021
Always Be Comedy Online: Online: 2022
Always Be Comedy (2 shows): The Tommyfield pub, Kennington, London, 2022
Always Be Comedy for Living Well Food Bank: Online: 2022
Jen Brister: The Optimist (Work In Progress): Camden Fringe: Camden Comedy Club, London, 2022
Jen Brister was a guest compere for a showcase at Always Be Comedy in London that I saw in 2017. She was excellent company with a dynamic range of funny stories, characters and situations that kept the audience entertained. Brister was a very engaging comedian effortlessly chatting with the audience before introducing the comedy acts which displayed confidence with lots of amusing routines competently told by an honest and satirically very funny woman.
I must be honest and say that I had not originally booked to see Brister’s show Meaningless at the Edinburgh Fringe in August 2018. I had already seen her Edinburgh preview which I had thoroughly enjoyed at Always Be Comedy in London in June 2018. However, the Fringe show I had originally booked to see was sold out and I had an hour to fill before my next show. I walked into the Monkey Barrel Comedy Club and booked a ticket. From the very start of Meaningless – a show about family life, she performed with such enthusiasm and talent emanating a power from the stage that was controlled and tempered, the audience immediately warmed to her. She displayed excessive levels of anger for comic effect but was also extremely charming, compelling, mocking and very genial. Early in the set, the audience were introduced to her Spanish mum who was acted out with such perfect comic precision throughout the hour that it brought the house down. Meaningless is an hour of angst about overstating frustrations delivered from a comedian who is at the top of her game.
I saw her again compering the third show of the day at The Big Funny Fest at Richmond and then performing her new full work-in-progress Edinburgh Fringe show at Always Be Comedy in London in June 2019. The tiring and depleted crowd at Richmond were thoroughly engaged with her lively sets whilst introducing the main acts and the preview show consistently entertained the crowd with everyday things that wound her up. The ace card was that she perfectly animated her stories with brilliantly observed act-outs and characters told with truth, humour and honesty.
In August 2019, I watched Brister perform her new show Under Privilege at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in August 2019 based on her experiences of motherhood to twin boys and attempting to bring them up, along with her girlfriend. The characters and situations that she created were uniquely accurate with razor-sharp timing and humour. She fearlessly commentated on middle-class white people and by extension, her life and her family and identified ways in which most of the audience profited from innate opportunity.
In June 2020, Brister was a hilarious guest on Vix Leyton’s new online show Comedy Roulette where she talked about subjects generated randomly from balls in a bingo machine. Also, in June, Brister co-hosted an online quiz with Kerry Godliman to raise money for the Bike Project which takes donated bikes, renews them and gives them to refugees. If you want to donate, please visit www.thebikeproject.co.uk. Brister and Godliman proved a wonderful double act. Brister created comedy with ease interplaying with her co-presenter whilst asking the questions and delivering the answers to an entertained audience. It was a perfect way to spend a Saturday night during the pandemic lockdown in the company of two great comedians. Brister also appeared as a wonderful guest for Always Be Comedy Online in June 2020 as well as starring in her own hour at the Next Up Comedy Festival in July 2020 where she hilariously described her experiences of living in lockdown and the show also featured comedian Maureen Younger. Effortlessly confident and armed with brilliantly funny routines, Brister was a superb compere for a show at the Greenwich Comedy Festival that I watched in September 2020 and deservedly received an encore for her brilliant set at Always Be Comedy live in October 2020 and appeared as a guest again at Always Be Comedy Online in November 2020 and The Return of The Craic Online Comedy Club in January 2021.
I watched An Evening with Jen Brister for Always Be Comedy Online in February 2021. Brister was extremely funny chatting to MC James Gill about her book The Other Mother and her comedy career. She also appeared for Always Be Comedy Online: Kerry Godliman Allstars where she described her experience of home schooling and again effortlessly left the audience helpless with laughter. The comedian delivered more hysterical routines when she played live for the Funny That Comedy Summer Festival at the Brighton Open Air Theatre in June 2021, for Comedy Allstars in September 2021, at the first Always Be Comedy online show a live new tour preview for 2022 and for Always Be Comedy Online for Living Well Food Bank in July 2022.
I watched the comedian’s brand-new work-in-progress show The Optimist for the Camden Fringe at the Camden Comedy Club in London in August 2022. Describing life after the pandemic and trying to cope during the crisis, she was as effortlessly funny as she has ever been delighting the audience with wonderful rants and stories.
The smash hit podcast Parenting Hell (www.podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/rob-beckett-and-josh-widdicombes-parenting-hell/id1510251497) about the ludicrousness of being a parent features Josh Widdicombe and Beckett who are both fathers. The podcast was turned into a book and in November 2022, I went to the Southbank Literary Festival at the Queen Elizabeth Hall to see the two of Britain’s most popular comedians in conversation with wonderful comic and mum, Brister. This was a wonderfully funny night with a Q & A session which included a signed copy of the book.
The comedian played the Always Be Comedy Wandsworth venue at Sambrook’s Brewery in December 2022 where, as ever, she demonstrated the art of performing comedy with an amazing confidence and side-splitting exaggeration. Talking about family life and career creating comic moment with such effortless ease, she was in total control of the room.
Brister is a hysterically funny woman who is a joy to watch and is highly recommended.