Mae Martin

Born: 02 May 1987

Age:

Years Active: 2001-present

Mae Pearl Martin (born 2 May 1987) is a Canadian comedian, actor, screenwriter, and recording artist. They co-created, co-wrote, and starred in the Channel 4/Netflix comedy series Feel Good. They received a nomination for the BAFTA TV Award for Best Female Comedy Performance for their work on the series.

Martin was born in Toronto, the child of Canadian writer and teacher Wendy Martin and English actor and musician-turned-food-writer James Chatto. They were baptized in a village on the Greek island of Corfu, where their family lived for several years. James and Wendy were ex-hippies and comedy fans. The family home was filled with recordings of British and American comedy classics.

Martin has described childhood obsessions with Bette Midler, The Kids in the Hall, Pee-wee Herman and The Rocky Horror Show (their grandfather, Tom Chatto, starred as narrator in the Rocky Horror stage version). Martin now points to these obsessions as early signs of an addictive personality. At 11 years old, they were taken to a comedy club and became interested in stand-up. Martin and two friends became known as "the Groupies" for going to see the Second City play Family Circus Maximus 160 times in a year.

Martin began booking gigs as part of the comedy troupe The Young and the Useless at age 13. At age 14, they started drinking and using illicit drugs. At age 15, they dropped out of the all-girls school they attended in Toronto to pursue comedy full-time while working at the Second City comedy club. At 16, Martin's parents kicked them out of their house, and Martin stayed with comedian friends throughout their 20s and 30s. Abusive relationships were normalised in the scene: Martin has said, "if you put a teenage girl in any industry like that, there's going to be people taking advantage". They eventually went to drug rehabilitation.