Born and raised in California, Al Madrigal lived on the same block as local legendary comics Michael Meehan and Michael Pritchard in San Francisco's Inner Sunset District. At a young age, he was drawn to the art of making people laugh, and by the time he was 12 years old, he would spend numerous hours watching all the televised stand-up and sketch comedy he could find, such as SCTV, Short Attention Span Theatre, Al Lubel and Dave Chappelle.

In 1994, Madrigal was two Spanish credits short of graduating from the University of San Francisco when he turned his back on his education and instead, worked for his family's staffing business. It was then when he rediscovered his childhood dream of becoming a comedian. He was already good at conversing with people over the phone at the office, so his mother gave him the task to speaking to them personally. By May 1998, Madrigal began doing stand-up comedy. He began his career by performing at open mic nights and one year later, he began receiving more offers to perform in front of larger audiences. He spent his first four years as a professional comedian with the SF Punchline and Cobb's Comedy Club, and later became the founding member of popular sketch comedy group The Fresh Robots.

Madrigal finally gained a shot at being famous when he was invited to perform for the prestigious Just for Laughs Comedy Festival in Montreal in July 2002. He was among twenty comics who performed their stand-up as part of the festival's "New Faces" segment before a huge crowd, along with TV and movie executives who were on the lookout for fresh comedic talents.

Madrigal was one of the fish that the executives caught, as he attended several auditions at various networks and following a nationwide search, Madrigal was chosen to star in CBS' The Ortegas, a show about a Mexican family who creates a talk show studio for their son in the back yard. There, Madrigal played the son of the character of Cheech Marin, who coincidentally was his idol. His other television credits include Comedy Central, Jimmy Kimmel Live and NBC's Late Friday.

Jesus of CBS' Welcome to the Captain is played by Al Madrigal. Jesus is the gossipy doorman of the fabled Hollywood apartment building, El Capitan or The Captain owned by Marty Tanner. Jesus claims that he knows all the eccentric residents' most well-kept secrets.

(Photo courtesy of CBS)