Comedian Scott Bennett has said how he "nearly killed" a fan last night at a gig by making him laugh so much. 

The show was at The Shinnon in North Wingfield, near Chesterfield. Bennett, who has just announced a new tour – dates here – explained what happened on his Facebook page.

“I should have filmed it. I'm actually annoyed I didn't film it because it had to be seen to be believed. So doing this gig, lovely audience, going really well. And I come to to wind up at the end and I start briefly talking about Olivia (his daughter), and I do a joke, where I talk about her being a little bit lazy and this guy on the front row just shouted 'backhander'. He said it twice, and I thought, I don't know. I think he was trying to say that, you know, that's the way to deal with it, a backhander. And I said that heckle has come straight from the 1970s. That's not how we deal with things any more. And he just said backhander again. And I thought, well, I don't know, is he some sort of traumatised tennis star and I've scratched some sort of memory regression and now every time tennis is said in public, he has to say backhander?

And then he started to choke. It looked like he was having some sort of heart attack, or he choked on a peanut. I'm stood on stage, and I'm sort of commentating on this emergency. And his sister, who was sat near him, just starts. You can tell this real sibling rivalry, because she's going “he always does this. He's dramatic. He always does this. This is his attention seeking.” Imagine being there at the funeral, doing the eulogy and she says “he always does this.” It was insane. So the whole place stops, right? Someone rings an ambulance, and then this guy steams over and does a Heimlich manoeuvre, and he's sort of salivating, and there's nothing coming out. I think he laughed so hard he sucked his drink in and it went into his lungs. So I can officially say I've nearly killed someone with my humour. 

I was panicked then, because you don't want that as an act, you know, you can't really use it. Killing audience members…And so, I made sure he was alright. It was really frightening because I thought I can't continue. You can't just keep doing stand up when a man's struggling to breathe. 

Eventually he started talking, and then he calmed down, and his sister went 'you see…' And they got him a drink of water and he recovered himself. But in my head, I'd already thought of a joke, I said, and I'm proud of myself doing this, but not proud of myself for doing this, but this is the comic’s brain. I said, 'can we have a round of applause for the man who stepped in to do the Heimlich manoeuvre? Wonderful, although I think a backhander would have been more effective.'

So I'm glad he's fine. And if you come to my gigs and come to the tour, just a word of warning, there is a possibility I will kill you laughing, you might not make it, which is a great disclaimer to put on the posters.”

You can read a full review of the show here.