Madame Funnypants
* Nominated for 'Best Comedic Duo' -Emerging Comics of New York Awards * Official Selection: Atlanta Improv Festival 2004 * 'Let's face it: Most sketch-comedy shows suck. You know it, we know it, and thankfully, Madame Funnypants knows it.' -Time Out New York * 'It doesn't get much funnier than this!' -Backstage * Official Selection: Miami Improv Festival 2003, 2004 * “Fresh and Unusual” -The Onion * Official Selection: Los Angeles Improv Festival 2004 * “Inventive with the added bonus of actually being funny” -Time Out New York * Official Selection: Atlanta Improv Festival 2004 * “Kinetic sketch pair Madame Funnypants performed admirably with theatrical meta-sketches about relationships and politics, including notable riffs on workplace romance and truly honest breakups.” -Uproar Magazine * Official Selection: HA! Comedy Festival 2003 * Critic's Pick -The Onion * “Negin Farsad and Alexander Zalben… poke fun at the bizarre compromises we make in order to find companionship. [It] doesn't get much funnier than this!” (January, 2003) -Backstage * Nominated for 'Best Comedic Duo' ECNYs (2003) * Official Selection: Chicago Sketchfest 2003, 2004, 2005 * “Creating sketch comedy is harder than Negin Farsad and Alexander Zalben make it look” -The Onion * Official Selection: DC Comedy Fest 2005 * “Negin Farsad and Alexander Zalben…poke fun at the bizarre compromises we make in order to find companionship. [It] doesn't get much funnier than this!” -Backstage * Critic's Pick -Time Out New York

Alex and Negin on couchMadame Funnypants is Negin Farsad and Alexander Zalben, a sketch comedy duo based in New York City that Time Out New York called, "unconventional and inventive." They have also been called "kinetic," "hilarious" and "talented," among other complimentary adjectives.

They have been nominated for Best Comedic Duo at the Emerging Comics of New York Awards, and performed around the country as an official selection of: Chicago SketchFest (2003, 2004); Atlanta Improv Festival (2004); Miami Improv Festival (2003, 2004); The Above Kleptomania Improv Comedy Festival (2002); HA! Comedy Festival (2003); and the Big Red Comedy Festival (2003).

Before forming Madame Funnypants, Negin and Alex spent three years as one half of the "unabashedly funny" and "brilliant" sketch comedy group Three Jews and a Persian.

NEGIN FARSAD — By day, she is a high powered Columbia graduate student. By night, she throws out those "books" to bust out onto the sketch comedy scene (and does she ever!). Other acting/comedy experience includes various roles in student films and on the Cornell stage. She is also a member of sketch group, Three Jews and a Persian, performing original hilarity all around town including stints at Caroline's, the Producer's Club and the Jean Cocteau Repertory. Improv comedy ventures have led her to various antics on the Upright Citizen's Brigade stage. She is also a political junkie, intending to lead a dual role as a comedian and politician in the future. Vote Farsad for President in 2016! Go ahead, waste a vote. She dares you.

ALEXANDER ZALBEN has performed in and/or directed shows at the Looking Glass Theatre, The Cherry Lane Theatre, and the Upright Citizen's Brigade Theatre in NYC. In addition, he has written for Modern Humorist, and is the co-creator of X-Ball Online. His one-act play, "All's Swell That Ends, Will," was performed at the Telluride Theatre Festival. He has worked at Playwrights Horizons, the Public Theatre, Jean Cocteau Repertory, Dramatists Play Service, and currently Tisch's Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program. Besides Madame Funnypants, he is a member of the sketch group Elephant Larry.

MFP: A Timeline

1994: Negin Farsad gets accepted to Cornell University. Soon after, she becomes the newest member of Cornell University's Only All-Sketch Comedy Group, Skits-O-Phrenics.

1995: Alexander Zalben gets accepted to Cornell University. Soon after, he becomes the newest member of Cornell University's Only All-Sketch Comedy Group, Skits-O-Phrenics. Two weeks after joining the group, Negin and Alex collaborate on their very first sketch together, entitled "Tour de Cornell." Hilariously, this sketch is performed for the first time in front of 6,000 people.

1999: After many years working long hard hours in the sketch writing sweatshops of the Skits-O-Phrenics, Alex graduates from Cornell. Negin, meanwhile, had been working for a year with three other graduates, Geoff Kirsch, Jason Reich, and Mike Wallach on a group, tentatively named Three Jews and a Persian. Mike decides to leave for stupid reasons (he went to work for ), and so Negin asks Alex whether he wanted Seeds of Peace to join up. Alex says yes.

2002: Three years later, 3JnP (as they are called by their fans), are the toast of the town. Negin and Alex, deciding to capitilize on their success, agree to perform a two person sketch comedy show. Space is rented, flyers made. Sketches are written, a director obtained. And so, Madame Funnypants is born... And then after we were born, we performed at the Red Room, September 18, 2002. It was fun, we sold out. Drinks were bought for all.