Leicester Comedy Festival 2024 Award Nominees Announced

The nominees for Leicester Comedy Festival 2024 Awards have been announced now that Leicester Comedy Festival and The UK Kids’ Comedy Festival have wrapped for 2024. This year’s festivities saw the highest ever ticket sales – with over 22388 tickets sold directly from the festival’s box office, equating to over a 10 percent increase in sales from 2023.

Acts and events nominated for this year’s awards, include shows from both The UK Kids’ Comedy Festival and Leicester Comedy Festival include Josh Glanc and Alex Camp for Best Variety Show, Jake Lambert and Susie McCabe for Best New Show, Jodie Mitchell, and Hannah Platt for Best Debut Show, Mr Sleepybum by Jody Kamali and Olaf Falafel’s Stupidest Super Stupid Show (yet) for Best Kids Show, Thanyia Moore and Milo Edwards for Best Show. The awards ceremony, which is hosted in partnership with De Montfort University, will take place on 18th March in Leicester, where the Legend of Comedy award will also be announced, recognising the outstanding achievement to British Comedy. Previous winners to the Legend of Comedy award include the late Barry Cryer and Victoria Wood as well as Sir Lenny Henry, Johnny Vegas, Stewart Lee and Jo Brand. The festival awards also highlight the people and venues behind the scenes, with nominations for Best New, Large and Small Venues and Promoters being announced today too. (The full list of nominees is below)

‘It’s been another excellent year for our festivals and the strength and variety of shows on offer is clear to see from this list of nominees. It’s 3 weeks of laughter across Leicestershire and it’s only possible thanks to all of our community who get behind our charity each year and help us to produce the festivals. The money generated from the festivals goes in to supporting further projects that benefit our community initiatives, workshops, discussions and more. We look forward to celebrating the success of this year’s festivals with all the nominees later this month.’ Michael Harris-Wakelam CEO, Big Difference Company

Leicester Comedy Festival 2024 featured 1026 performances with 754 shows throughout the month, in over 65 venues across Leicester and Leicestershire, with 45,000 minutes watched on NextUp. This year, there were 10 shows live streamed, including the UK Pun Championships, Best in Class and Leicester Mercury Comedian of the Year. For the first time, there was an app that enabled audiences to find and book shows.

There were a huge number of sell out shows this festival, including Angela Barnes, Sarah Keyworth, Abi Clarke, Daniel Foxx, Mark Watson, Ania Magliano, Seann Walsh, Sam Campbell, Rachel Fairburn, Nick Helm, Olga Koch, Sophie Duker, Helen Bauer and Catherine Bohart.

Kev Mud won the UK Pun Championships, Kevin Daniel won The Silver Stand Up competition and Eva Bindeman was crowned Leicester Mercury Comedian of the Year.

‘We are incredibly proud of this year’s festival, the largest one ever, which once again celebrated British comedy in all its forms. The last 3 weeks have seen Leicester buzzing with comedians from all over the country, new and established, trying material for the first time or touring big shows. It’s been extremely rewarding to see people having a good time, laughing, going from venue to venue and enjoying the festivals. We are so thankful to our venues, promoters, staff, performers, volunteers and partners who all play a major part in making Leicester Comedy Festival and The UK Kids’ Comedy Festival 2024 so successful.

We are thrilled to announce the nominees of our annual awards, which once again demonstrates the range and diversity of acts that perform at our festivals. We’re looking forward to the ceremony later this month and announcing the winners.’ Charlotte Laidet Festivals & Programme Director

The UK Kids’ Comedy Festival 2024, featured over 50 events in 27 venues. Comedians & Shows at The UK Kids’ Comedy Festival included: Marcel Lucont, Comedy in the Dark for Kids, Rosie Jones, The Mighty Kids Beatbox Comedy Show Strikes Back, Jeddy Bear and Gary’s Chemistry of Chaos, Count Arthur Strong, The Lovely Boys, and SHELF. The UK Kids’ Comedy Festival engaged 14 schools, over 550 primary school children for Loving Laughing. It delivered eight joke spots which attracted 200 children. Sixteen 11-18 year olds attended workshops to learn how to write and perform jokes as part of Laugh Academy.

‘We are so lucky to be able to host The UK Kids’ Comedy Festival to bring the highest quality children & family comedians to Leicestershire for 19 days of fun. This year was no exception – and we’re incredibly proud to say that already this year was our best attended festival yet, with thousands of families seeing shows, taking part and laughing together. We also gave hundreds of children and young people their first taste of performing comedy through our Loving Laughing, Joke Spot and Laugh Academy programmes. Most importantly though, we got to embarrass PLENTY of dads. The festival wouldn’t be possible without the support of our acts, venues, promoters, volunteers, facilitators, partners, community groups and audiences and we continue to be so thankful for their contributions. We can’t wait to see what next year brings!’ Chris Butler, Producer, The UK Kids’ Comedy Festival,

The full list of awards nominations are below:
Best Small Venue
Firebug
King Richard III Pub
Peter Pizzeria
The Big Difference
The Black Horse
Best Large Venue
Curve Theatre
De Montfort Hall
Market Hall
Mountsorrel Memorial Centre
The Y theatre
Wycliffe Rooms
Best New Venue
East Street Lanes
James Café Bistro
Phoenix Terrace Room
Real Ale Classroom
Best Kids Show
Jeddy Bear & Gary’s Chemistry of Chaos
Mr Sleepybum by Jody Kamali
Olaf Falafel’s Stupidest Super Stupid Show (Yet)
Strictly Barking
The Mighty Kids Beatbox Comedy Show
Best Variety Show
Alex Camp: Songs About Love & Food
Bad Clowns: Hostage
David Eagle: Flying Solo
Lil Wenker: Bangtail
Josh Glanc: Collections
The Burlesque Imposter
The Last Gun: Will BF
The Totally Improvised Musical
Best New Show
George Lewis: Men Behaving Dadly
Jake Lambert: The Sunshine Kid (Work in Progress)
James Trickey: Don’t Count On Me (WIP)
Luke Rollason: Luke Rollason, Let Down Your Hair
Rich Wilson: The Train, The Story and The Bump
Susie McCabe: Work in Progress
Best Debut Show
Hannah Platt: Defence Mechanism
Jack Skipper: Work in Progress
Jodie Mitchell: Becoming John Travulva
Kathy Maniura: Objectified
Kayleigh Jones: I Fed My Day To A Pelican
Kev Mud: Homeless Sex Biscuit
Best Show
Daniel Foxx: Villain
Darran Griffiths: Inconceivable
Joe Kent-Walters: An Audience With Frankie Monroe
Michael Brunström: Copernicus Now
Milo Edwards: Sentimental
Thanyia Moore: August
Audience Choice
14/48 Takeover – performance
Dan Driver: The Sound of Muzak
Everyday I’m Jesterin’
Jon Hipkiss – An Evening You Won’t Regret Unless You Don’t Like It
Laura Patch: Glorious
Nick Helm: Masterworks in Progress 2024
Best Poster
Carol’s Cost of Living Craft Show
Fine, Fine, Everything is Fine: Richard Todd
Free Range: Geoff Alderman
Lil Wenker is Bangtail
A Comedian Dressed like a Wizard* Answers a Ringing Phone, Describes What is Happening for Fifty-Two Minutes, And Then Leaves: Rob Kemp
Liberty Award
Festival Hub
Popcorn Funnies in Association with BFI Network
Lukewarm Losers
Weirdos Comedy Weekender
Best Promoter
Foxy Comedy
Jokes On Us
Just The Tonic
Late Stage
Monster Comedy
TripleCeePee
Tracey Miller Community Award
All In Leicester
Better Points
Kate Frow of Foxton Primary School
Leicester Libraries
Menphys
Student of the Year
Amisha Brandreth
Caitlin Harries
Ellie Skinner
Fengjiao Li
Liv Mills
Molly Wilby
Peter Wan
Rhian Hiorns
Business Contribution
Hotel Brooklyn Leicester
Howes Percival LLP
Menphys
Phoenix Cinema and Art Centre
Soft Touch Arts & Jerroms Miller Specialist Tax
The Beautiful Pubs Collective
TT Country Events
Warning Zone Life Skills
Contribution to Leicester Comedy Festival 24
14/48
Ben Robinson
Reflections Design – for Laughter Pop
Peril Design / Paul Banks