Mark Dolan

Dolan was the host of Channel 4 show Balls of Steel, which he presented from 2005 to 2008 and for which he won Best Presenter at the NRTA Awards. He was also the presenter of the TV documentary series The World's ...And Me, in which he met some of "the world's most extraordinary people", including the tallest woman in the world, the smallest man and the richest teenager. The show ran to three series and twelve one-hour films and led to the release of the book The World's Most Extraordinary People and Me, published by Harper Collins.

Dolan first came to the public's attention in 2002 after writing and performing in a Comedy Lab entitled The Richard Taylor Interviews.[2]

In 2006, Dolan helped launch More4 as the host of The Last Word, a nightly topical discussion show. He has also fronted shows for E4, including its launch comedy series, Show Me The Funny, and provides his voice as presenter of a new series for Five called Urban Legends. For five years, Dolan was the presenter of Sky Movies' weekly movie-news show 35mm[3] and Channel 4's The Mad Bad Ad Show.

In February 2013, Dolan took part in the fifth series of Let's Dance for Comic Relief as a member of "Destiny's Dad" alongside fellow stand-up comedians Hal Cruttenden and Shaun Keaveny.[4]

In 2015, Dolan co-hosted If Katie Hopkins Ruled the World with British reality TV personality Katie Hopkins.[5]

In 2016, he won the Celebrity Come Dine With Me Christmas Special, with a Dickensian themed meal of pea soup, three bird roast and plum duff as desert. He also starred in the third and final series of the C4 wintersports entertainment show The Jump, alongside Sir Bradley Wiggins, Robbie Fowler and Jason Robinson.

Dolan started as a stand-up comedian in 2000, reaching the final of Channel 4's So You Think You're Funny competition in his first year of performing.. He has toured the world as a live comic and has performed 11 runs at the Edinburgh Fringe. He won an award at the 2018 Leicester Mercury Comedy Festival for best joke of the festival and performed online during the Coronavirus pandemic.

Dolan's career in media began as a radio producer, working for the female-only Viva Radio, 963 Liberty and the original incarnation of talkRADIO and then talkSPORT. He was the producer of the Nick Ferrari and David Banks-fronted Big Boys' Breakfast, to which he also contributed comedy sketches.

In 2017 Dolan returned to radio, presenting a breakfast show on Fubar Radio, an online radio station based in London.[6]

In 2019, Dolan joined the presenting line-up at talkRADIO, where he hosts Friday Drivetime from 4pm to 7, Saturday nights 10pm to 1 and Sundays 8pm to 10.

In September 2020, Dolan cut up a disposable mask during a Talkradio broadcast, while claiming that wearing masks did not have a significant impact on COVID-19.[7] His action was widely condemned; show host Jamie East quit the radio station in protest of Dolan's actions going unsanctioned by station bosses. Piers Morgan criticised his action on Good Morning Britain and stated, “If we want to save lives [...] we need to get rid of the wretched Mark Dolan because he should not be doing that on his show. talkRADIO should think about people like Mark Dolan doing things like that on air because that will cost lives. People may die because he did that. Is that what you want to be associated with? It’s reckless and stupid”. Doctor Hilary Jones agreed with Morgan and commented, “I’d like to see him walk down the corridors of a hospital where they’ve got people on ventilators, people on CPAP masks where they’ve got people still in recovery many days after being hospitalised for Covid-19”.[8] Dolan claimed on the same show that he always wore a face covering in all mandated locations and also followed wider health advice.