Today we’d like to introduce you to Brooklyn Jones.
Hi Brooklyn, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
I started comedy in New York. My friends always told me that I was hilarious and should be a comedian, so one day I decided to try it. I signed up for a comedy workshop run by comedian Clayton Fletcher in New York. He taught us the basics of the business of comedy, etiquette, how to format a joke to not make the setup too long and get to the funny quickly. It was a very informative class and a safe space to try comedy in front of a like-minded group of people. After the 3-week workshop, we performed comedy at New York Comedy Club in front of an audience of our family and friends. It went very well and that’s when I knew that my friends were right, and comedy was my calling.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey has been a fairly smooth road?
Comedy was going well but life got in the way, so things were definitely not smooth. I wasn’t able to focus on comedy the way I wanted to because I was between jobs, and not long after I lost my job, my apartment building caught fire, so I was also “between homes”. Finding yourself homeless in the winter is not a good look! Thank God for my sister Lisa, I was able to stay with her for a couple of weeks while figuring out my next move. I decided that since I was starting from scratch that I would start over in Los Angeles. So, I took my one suitcase and my unemployment checks and moved from New York to Los Angeles.
It was pretty challenging, but I have a good foundation of friends here in Los Angeles. I am very close friends with the singer Shanice Wilson and her husband actor Flex Alexander. They allowed me to stay with them for a couple of months while I got on my feet. It just so happened that while I was staying there, they had started shooting their reality show “Flex & Shanice” on the Oprah Winfrey Network. The producers thought I was funny and liked my personality and they asked me to be on the show. So, in a matter of months, I went from homeless and jobless to being on a TV show! Life is WILD that way!
After staying with Shanice and Flex for a while, I moved out and roomed with some other friends and then finally got into my own apartment. Once I was more established with my living situation, I started back with my comedy career. So even though technically I started comedy about 9 years ago, I feel like I’ve really only been doing it about 5 years because between my shaky living situation and then the pandemic, I wasn’t able to focus on it the way I wanted to. I’m making up for that time now and things are getting back on track.
Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
I am a comedian. I specialize in Stand-Up comedy. Even though I am funny, I’m still learning the ropes of the business side and how to get more bookings and do more road work. That part has been challenging because being successful in the comedy business is all about networking and I am an introvert. I have been working more on coming out of my shell, being more present within the comedy circuit and getting my face and name known amongst my peers and bookers. Just when I was starting to do more of that the pandemic hit and everything shut down. Now that things have opened up again, I am starting to get back out there.
Right now I am most proud of my comedy specials. I have one on Comedy Cube’s YouTube channel entitled “Broke Famous”, I also have another one on the AllBlk streaming platform, it is part of The Comedy Underground Series, I am on season 2. I also have a comedy special called “Black Girl Magic” produced by KiKi Melendez and Maverick Entertainment I shot in the Dominican Republic with fellow hilarious female comedians Crystal Powell, Just Nesh, Kelly Kellz, Alicia Cooper and Ashima Franklin. It’s currently streaming on Amazon Prime and Tubi. It was an extraordinary experience.
What sets me apart from others is that I am ME and nobody else can be ME but ME. My comedy is about my life, my own observations, my thought process. So, nobody else can tell my story. Many of us may have similar experiences and backgrounds but we all have our own stories, and nobody can tell my story but me. Another thing that sets me apart from a lot of comedians is I work mostly clean. I don’t tend to talk about raunchy topics and I don’t cuss in my comedy unless it’s absolutely called for. Like if a specific bad word will make the joke funnier then maybe I will use it if it’s crucial to the joke, but for the most part, I work clean. But I’m not judging anyone else for their subject matter of the language they use. It’s all art and everyone has their own story, ways of telling it and interpretation and that is a beautiful thing.
I really hate the cancel culture of today and the way it is causing a lot of comedians to feel that they have to tiptoe around. Comedy is therapy and we should be able to joke about any and everything as long as the joke is funny. But that’s my opinion.
What sort of changes are you expecting over the next 5-10 years?
Within the next 5-10 years I think that people are going to get fed up with cancel culture and people are going to go above and beyond to push the envelope and make people even more mad in a “oh you wanna be mad? I’ll GIVE you something to be mad about” sort of deal and I’m kind of here for it because people are so sensitive nowadays. Shows like The Jeffersons, All In The Family and The Honeymooners would be canceled immediately nowadays because of the language, the jokes and the subject matter. And those were classic hilarious shows! We need that edginess back in our lives. People want to be too safe and too sensitive, and it takes away from artistic freedom and it’s also unrealistic. In one breath people want you to “Keep it real” but then when you do, they’re like “no not like that” so hopefully in the next 5-10 years we can be edgy the way we were in the past. I’m not saying just be offensive for no reason! But we should be able to express ourselves artistically and not be so whiny about everything. Like if you go to other countries, their tv commercials are way edgier than ours! We are so watered down it’s ridiculous. COME ON AMERICA! LIVE A LITTLE. OR A LOT!
Contact Info:
- Website: www.itsbrooklynjones.com
- Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/itsbrooklynjones
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ItsBrooklynJones/
- Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/itsbklynjones
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/BrooklynJonesComedy
Image Credits
Karolina Bryner
James Rios
Steve Royall
