'My life is a series of embarrassing incidents strung together by telling people about those embarrassing incidents.



Russell Brand grew up in Essex. His father left when he was three months old, he was bulimic at 12, and left school at 16 to study at the Italia Conti stage school. There, he began drinking heavily and taking drugs. In 2003, he was told that he would be in prison, in a metal hospital or dead within six months unless he went in to rehab. He decided to get clean, and has since become an internationally successful stand-up comedian, TV host, radio broadcaster and columnist, and is also the patron of 'Focus 12', a charity helping people with alcohol and substance misuse.