Neal Brennan

Photo courtesy of the artist

Neal Brennan

Neal Brennan’s long and impressive comedy career has mostly been in collaboration with other comic minds. He’s best known for co-creating Chappelle’s Show, one of the most influential sketch-comedy series of the 2000s (Brennan directed the classic Rick James sketch). More recently, he’s been visible as “Noah’s Friend Neal” on The Daily Show, appearing onscreen to banter with Trevor Noah. He’s continued collaborating with many other comics, executive-producing Chris Rock’s 2018 special Tambourine, directing Michelle Wolf’s HBO special Nice Lady, and cowriting the film The Female Brain with Whitney Cummings. Brennan’s helped some of the funniest people alive be funnier. Here’s a chance to see how funny he is on his own. Also, if you get to talk to him after the show, find out if he still has any copies of the 2006 VH1 eighties parody movie Totally Awesome!, which he made with The Good Place’s Michael Schur. That thing is impossible to find. —Zack Smith