User:Strugglehouse/sandbox/Max Fosh

Maximilian Arthur Fosh (born 3 April 1995) is a British YouTuber and comedian. As of February 2024, his eponymous YouTube channel has over 3.6 million subscribers.

Early life
Maximilian Arthur Fosh was born on 3 April 1995 in London, England, to father Matthew Fosh and mother Helena, and has an older sister, Talitha Fosh. He attended Arnold House School in Westminster, London, before progressing to Harrow School - the same school his father attended - and was in Bradbys House at Harrow from 2008 until 2013, from ages 13–18.

Radio
While studying for a combined honours in English literature and business at Newcastle University, Fosh began presenting at Radio Tyneside. When at Radio Tyneside, he won gold in the "Best Newcomer" category at the National Hospital Radio Awards in 2017.

On Christmas Day in 2022, Fosh presented a half-hour "TikTok Takeover" show on BBC Radio 1, following an event almost two years earlier which involved printing his CV in large text on the roof of a car, and parking it outside of Broadcasting House in London.

YouTube
Fosh's main and eponymous YouTube channel has amassed more than 3.6 million subscribers, and includes "silly" pranks and jokes - as well as other comedic content. The channel was started on 13 January 2016 and posted its inaugural video on 18 October 2017, which started a series called "StreetSmart" (the channel's name at the time) where Fosh would interview people on the streets.

Gatwick Airport prank
In May 2022, Fosh placed a large sign reading "Welcome to Luton", visible from the approach path for Gatwick Airport, to trick arriving travellers into thinking they were instead at Luton Airport, triggering reactions from local news and social media  The sign was 60 m long with the letters each 8 x and, although initially anonymous, Fosh claimed the prank on Justin Dealey's show on BBC Three Counties Radio, as well as tweeting "Guilty..." as a reply to another tweet picturing the sign. Being noticed by the media, Fosh made several appearances on TV and radio, although some people criticised the prank as having caused undue stress for arriving passengers. Fosh had use of the land on which the sign was placed for six weeks, and said that renting the land and materials for the sign cost more than £4000.

The following month, BBC Three Counties put a similar sign reading "Welcome to Paradise" under the approach to Luton Airport.

Stand-up comedy
Following his YouTube success, in 2021 Fosh toured the UK with his show "Zocial Butterfly", which he had originally written in 2019. He then went on to take the show to the Edinburgh Fringe in August 2022, his debut at the festival, Isobel Lewis of The Independent rated the performance two out of five stars, said he was "promising" despite lacking the "comedy chops needed for a Fringe show." On 3 November 2022, Fosh played the show in London once again, this time at the London Palladium.

Other
On 9 September 2023, Fosh played in the Sidemen charity match, an association football match to raise money for charity, for the YouTube Allstars team. He scored the 7th goal of the match in the 56th minute. In the 78th minute, Fosh tackled and fouled Sidemen member Miniminter, resulting in referee Mark Clattenburg issuing him a yellow card. In response, Fosh pulled an Uno "reverse card" from his shorts and showed it to Clattenburg, garnering Internet and media attention.

2021 London mayoral candidate
Fosh was an independent candidate in the 2021 London mayoral election, which was eventually won by the incumbent, Sadiq Khan. Fosh admitted to running simply to "wind up" fellow former Harrovian Laurence Fox, who was running as a right-wing candidate for the Reclaim Party, which Fox had recently founded. Fosh aimed to get more votes than Fox, as well as increase youth turnout.

Fosh launched his campaign in a YouTube video on 12 March 2021, although did not expect to win and even encouraged people not to vote for him, claiming "I would make a terrible mayor". His jovial policies included putting a seed in every cigarette butt, providing every household with a cow so they know when it is going to rain, and carpeting the M25 to make it "the smoothest motorway in the world"; he also said he would replace all police sirens with Fox's song "The Distance", which he quipped would make people move out of the way 23% faster. Given this election was held in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, Fosh also said "I would listen to all of the scientists and people from industry to try and get us the best solution to get us out of COVID-19", which was in direct contrast to Fox who had been a vaccine skeptic.

On 30 March 2021, Fosh appeared at Fox's campaign launch. Fox arrived on a classic London Routemaster bus, emblazoned with his campaign messaging. Fosh had been tipped off about this and pulled up alongside in a small red car, printed with the slogan "Don't believe everything you see on a bus".

After Fox agreed to a policy debate against Fosh, on 28 April 2021, Fosh arrived outside Fox's campaign headquarters with two lecterns, but Fox did not show. Over the course of the campaign, Fosh also snuck into Fox's headquarters and registeredlaurencefox.orgto display his manifesto. In the election, Fosh finished in 19th place out of 20 with 6,309 (0.2 per cent) of the votes.