Tshepo Mogale started doing stand up comedy in 1999 in Cape Town. Tshepo Mogale first show was at a comedy competition at a venue called Hobnobs, where let’s just say Tshepo Mogale wasn’t welcome there anymore. At about the same time that he started his comedy career was the same time that the Cape Comedy Collective was created, which was a collective of about 25 comics who some are very big around the country now. So Tshepo Mogale performed all around Cape Town performing in classy and dingy venues with the home base being the Cape Comedy Club namely the Armchair Theatre in Observatory.
Tshepo Mogale then joined the CCC on a very successful Varsities tour in late 2000, which was a tour of all major universities in South Africa. The whole time as this was going on he was fully employed as a semi computer geek for an Internet company in Cape Town. While doing all of this he did television adverts for various brands including Smirnoff and also radio voice overs.
In 2000 Tshepo Mogale decided to move to Joburg to broaden his comedy horizons and also to work in a financial services company. Tshepo Mogale immediately got onto the Joburg circuit and became a hit in the popular Joe Parker Comedy Express circuit. Performing in Joburg gave Tshepo Mogale a wider range of exposure, which resulted in him doing many stints on television doing stand up and various acting gigs, where Tshepo Mogale featured on the highly acclaimed Parker Comedy express dvd, which was released in 2001. All this was done while the brother was pushing a full time job. Tshepo Mogale then started to more and more shows outside of Johannesburg in places like Durban, Bloemfontein, Vereeneging etc. which grew his exposure and popularity amongst the South African public. In 2002 Tshepo Mogale was invited to perform at the first all black comedy festival, the Smirnoff Comedy Blackout which featured some international acts from the U.S. While balancing his day job at a bank and doing stand up. Towards the end of 2002 Tshepo Mogale was again selected to perform at the biggest comedy event in South Africa the Laugh out Loud to an audience of more than 7000 people.
At this time Tshepo Mogale also partook in the Sprite Soul Comedy tour which took comedy to many South African small towns namely Kimberly, Bloemfontein, Pietersburg Nelspruit etc. This was also with a lot of corporate events in between. Tshepo Mogale went to on to write some literature which got published in the popular Urban writers series. Tshepo Mogale then went on to open for Barry Hilton at some of his theatre shows and some of his corporate events. Tshepo Mogale was invited to be one of the South African representative at the prestigious Smirnoff Comedy Festival which is the second biggest comedy event in the Southern hemisphere.
Within a month of returning from the comedy festival Tshepo Mogale was invited to perform in the second comedy Blackout which featured top comedy acts from the United States and South Africa including David Kau and Kagiso Lediga. With all this happening Tshepo Mogale has become a writer for the Pure Monate Show which was arguably the most popular show on television amongst black youths. Tshepo Mogale has also worked as a master of ceremonies for corporate clients all around South Africa and various festivals. Tshepo Mogale also did crowd warm ups and emceeing at the All Africa Kora Awards which resulted in him sharing the stage with many of the continents top artists and some international superstars including Kofi Olo Mode Angie Stone and Ludacris amongst others.
Tshepo Mogale went on to kwaito comedy musical CD under the alias Spykos which went to sell in excess of 25 000 copies. Spykos went on to perform at many different venues from Cape Town to Venda to Polokwane to Zimbabwe to Swaziland in many places where he has shred the stage with the biggest musical acts in South Africa from including Zola, Malaika, Pitch Black Afro and many more. Spykos went on the charts and made it to number in many southern African countries including Botswana, Zimbabwe, Swaziland, Namibia and Angola. With the popularity of Spykos and Tshepo Mogale talent as a comedian it makes him have the ability to perform to the most sophisticated of audiences to the bluest of the blue collar audiences.
In mid 2005 Tshepo Mogale was invited as a writer and performer to appear on the MNET show Laugh out Loud with Jeremy Mansfield and Darren Simpson doing pranks on celebrities and the public. Since then Tshepo Mogale has appeared and written on a number of television shows including, Kompleks on SABC 2, the Calling on SABC 1, Font and sons on SABC 3 and was a writer on the controversial The Coconuts. Tshepo Mogale went on to host a motorsport show on Supersport 2 called Overdrive amongst performing stand up and his writing commitments. Tshepo Mogale also produced the highly acclaimed Tshwane comedy festival which had sold out audiences. Tshepo Mogale and his media compny Hotplate Media have gone to produce many comedy events in casinos, theatres and many venues around South Africa
In 2010 Tshepo Mogale worked as creative director and writer on the record breaking tv show Tonight With Trevor Noah… Tshepo Mogale was invited to perform in Kenya with some of the best comedians in Africa for a tv special Live in Mombasa… Tshepo Mogale currently tours Africa doing comedy shows and producing shows all around the country.
