By Megan O’Neill

With over 3.5 billion YouTube views and an E4 deal, The Wall Group is running riot across social media with its blend of entertainment and comedy content, but who are they… or rather, what is it?

Thanks for asking. Let me explain -

The Wall of Comedy was launched in 2015 by Joivan Wade, Percelle Ascott, and Dee Kaate - all of whom were only in their early 20s at the time. Just four years later, by 2019, they had achieved over 3.5 billion views across their content, with a reach of over 120,000,000 per week and growing even more through 2020. 

Their online platform has since become The Wall of Entertainment Group which covers YouTube (Wall of Entertainment), Facebook (Wall of Viral), and Instagram (Wall of Comedy), as well as a Wall of Music, Wall of Talent and their production services arm, Wall of Productions.

The Wall Group has produced several original and viral comedy programmes including Who’s the Daddy, Group Chat, and Questions with Yung Filly. The platform regularly features interviews with some of the UK’s biggest social media content creators. 

It wasn’t always easy for the trio as they initially began their career in comedy with YouTube channel Mandem on the Wall in 2011, which consisted of the three South London lads sitting on a wall and talking about life. This boosted their careers and within a month the episode had achieved over one million views with an audience of primarily teens and young adults. 

Ascott said the idea for Mandem on the Wall sparked from their time at the Brit School. “It’s about three friends who sit on the wall and talk about daily events and their everyday life. We wanted to invert that negative connotation that there is about boys in streetwear.” How’s that for taking an idea and working hard to make a career out of it?

Indeed, Mandem on the Wall eventually made its way to Big Talk Productions who became interested in the trio and encouraged them to pitch their own show. Unfortunately, while the show didn’t materialise, the boys were selected for various other roles including for EastEnders. As a result, Mandem on the Wall fizzled out and the audience was lost. 

In 2015, however, Wade, Ascott, and Kaate created a Facebook page called Wall of Comedy and haven’t looked back since. The trio say they never think about failure, rather how they can re-evaluate their strategies to come back stronger – perhaps a mantra we should all live by. 

Wade explained why they created the platform: “I still don’t think we get offered enough roles, as young black actors. [So we were] forced to create our own work and create the roles that we want to play. It’s allowed us to establish ourselves and get out there so that people in positions of power, commissioners, producers, directors, can trust us and be able to give us a role that’s not just ‘Thug # 1’, ‘Thug #2’ and ‘Hoodie #3’. The reason why it’s this way is because there’s not enough diversity in positions of power. I’m not talking just black, Asian, ethnicity minorities; I’m talking women, disability, and diversity across the board.”

It has been proven that the UK media workforce is a particularly non-diverse setting, both on and off screen (see other articles on this published by us), so the three friends saw an opportunity for success and a gap in the market, and evidently that paid off. 

What they’re doing now:

2019 was a big year for the trio as Wall of Comedy rocketed, they then co-founded Wall of Music to promote their own music and support other artists’ musical talents, as well as Wall of Talent to support up-and-coming actors.

Following The Wall of Comedy’s huge success on social media over four years, in July 2019 E4 agreed a major development deal that will see multiple projects across entertainment and drama, whilst working closely with Ascott, Wade and their managing director Tafara Makopa. Commenting at the time, Ascott said, “We’re delighted to have secured this deal with a partner who shares our same ethos and has a reputation for producing award-winning programming”.

Wade added to the excitement: “This is a great time for us and now working in partnership with E4 is the opportunity we have been looking for. Working and nurturing great talent within our space and creating a multitude of entertaining online formats has always been our passion and to have such a fantastic broadcaster who believes in us to do the same for television is amazing.”

With their E4 deal and their innovative, expanding brand, we will be seeing a lot more of the entrepreneurs behind The Wall Group and the much-needed diversity their content will bring to our screens.