Tom Allen is an English

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 stand up comedian

Comedian

A comedian or comic is a person who seeks to entertain an audience, primarily by making them laugh. This might be through jokes or amusing situations, or acting a fool, as in slapstick, or employing prop comedy...

 actor and writer.

At the age of 22 Allen won the UK's most prestigious comedy newcomer award So You Think You're Funny

So You Think You're Funny

So You Think You're Funny? is an annual stand-up comedy competition for new acts. The competition began in 1988 and has become the longest running best comedy newcomer award in Great Britain....

 in 2005. The same year he won the BBC New Comedy Awards

BBC New Comedy Awards

The BBC New Comedy Awards first appeared in 1995 and were considered to be one of the top UK comedy newcomer awards until they were axed in 2006. It was announced in the summer of 2006 that they were being replaced by a nationwide talent hunt that places its emphasis on sketch writing and filmed...

. He performed with fellow So You Think You're Funny winner Tom Wrigglesworth

Tom Wrigglesworth

Tom Wrigglesworth is an English stand-up comedian from Sheffield, Yorkshire. He has won the comedy newcomer award So You Think You're Funny? at the 2003 Edinburgh Festival Fringe. In 2006 he performed with fellow comedian Tom Allen as a part of the show Allen and Wrigglesworth. In 2009 he was...

 at the 2006 Edinburgh Festival Fringe

2006 Edinburgh Festival Fringe

-Events:2006 was the first Fringe following the introduction of the new legislation banning smoking indoors. During a photocall at the Assembly Rooms for a play in which he was playing Winston Churchill, the actor Mel Smith lit a cigar, flouting the ban...

 in the show Allen & Wrigglesworth.

He has performed at Just For Laughs

Just for Laughs

Just for Laughs is a comedy festival held each July in Montreal, Quebec, founded in 1983. It is the largest international comedy festival in the world.- Information :...

 in Montreal, London’s Soho Theatre

Soho Theatre

Soho Theatre is a theatre in the eponymous Soho district of the City of Westminster. It presents new works of theatre, together with comedy and cabaret....

, New York’s UCB Theatre and has had his own show at the Edinburgh Fringe for the past three years - 'Tom Allen and Other Short Stories'; 'A Voyage Round My Mother' and 'Women!'

In 2009 he appeared in Channel 4’s weekly TNT Show writing and presenting Dictionary Corner.

He has also co written and recorded 2 series of The Correspondent for BBC Radio 4

BBC Radio 4

BBC Radio 4 is a British domestic radio station, operated and owned by the BBC, that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. The station controller is currently Gwyneth Williams, and the...

. In 2009 he made guest appearances on Loose Ends, The Richard Bacon Show, Big Brother’s Big Mouth and Big Brother’s Little Brother.

He took the lead role of young Pip Bin in the BBC Radio Four comedy Bleak Expectations

Bleak Expectations

Bleak Expectations is a Radio 4 comedy series, whose first series premiered in August 2007. It is a pastiche of the works of Charles Dickens – such as Bleak House and Great Expectations, from which it derives its name – and costume dramas set in the same period, and parodies several of their plot...

, which has so far run to four series (2007, 2008, 2009, 2010) with Anthony Head

Anthony Head

Anthony Stewart Head , usually credited as Anthony Head, is an English actor and musician. He rose to fame in the UK following his role in television advertisements for Nescafé Gold Blend , and is known for his roles as Rupert Giles in Buffy the Vampire Slayer and as Uther Pendragon in...

 and Richard Johnson

Richard Johnson (actor)

Richard Johnson is an English actor, writer and producer, who starred in several British films of the 1960s and has also had a distinguished stage career. He most recently appeared in The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas.-Life and career:...

.

In 2008 he recorded a radio adaptation of The Wooden Overcoat with Julia Davis

Julia Davis

Julia Davis is an English comedy writer and performer, best known for writing and starring in the BBC Three comedy Nighty Night.-Background:...

 and David Tennant

David Tennant

David Tennant is a Scottish actor. In addition to his work in theatre, including a widely praised Hamlet, Tennant is best known for his role as the tenth incarnation of the Doctor in Doctor Who, along with the title role in the 2005 TV serial Casanova and as Barty Crouch, Jr...

 and written by Mark Gatiss

Mark Gatiss

Mark Gatiss is an English actor, screenwriter and novelist. He is best known as a member of the comedy team The League of Gentlemen, and has both written for and acted in the TV series Doctor Who and Sherlock....

.

For television he has appeared in BBC’s Sensitive Skin, Fear of Fanny, the Frankie Howerd biopic Rather You Than Me and the series The Cut as well as Channel 4’s Law of the Playground. Last year he made his own documentary for E4 about identity entitled ‘Who is Tom Allen?’

Film includes Colour Me Kubrick with John Malkovich, Starter for Ten with James McAvoy and Mark Gatiss and the forthcoming Stephen Frears film, Tamara Drewe.

He trained with the National Youth Theatre

National Youth Theatre

The National Youth Theatre is a registered charity in London, Great Britain, committed to creative, personal and social development of young people through the medium of creative arts....

 performing with the company in London and Manchester in addition to working on outreach projects, films and also forming part of their Company Management Team.

Awards and Nominations for Stand Up Comedy

• In 2005 he won So You Think You're Funny
  So You Think You're Funny
  So You Think You're Funny? is an annual stand-up comedy competition for new acts. The competition began in 1988 and has become the longest running best comedy newcomer award in Great Britain....
  
  
• In 2005 he won the BBC New Comedy Awards
  BBC New Comedy Awards
  The BBC New Comedy Awards first appeared in 1995 and were considered to be one of the top UK comedy newcomer awards until they were axed in 2006. It was announced in the summer of 2006 that they were being replaced by a nationwide talent hunt that places its emphasis on sketch writing and filmed...
  
  

External links

• Website for Tom Allen http://www.tomindeed.com
• Chortle Page for Tom Allenhttp://www.chortle.co.uk/comics/t/565/tom_allen
• Chortle page for Allen & Wrigglesworth http://www.chortle.co.uk/shows/edinburgh_fringe_festival_2006/a/14562/allen_and_wrigglesworth