The finalists have been announced for the UK Pun Championships 2019, which will take place at the Leicester Comedy Festival on UK PunDay.
11th February marks the UK’s fourth ever UK PunDay, an annual event in which pun fans around the country unite to share their best (and worst) puns on social media, using hashtag #UKPunDay. Each year #UKPunDay trends on Twitter, with thousands of people tweeting throughout the day, attracting over 30 million impressions, with the best jokes making it onto BBC Radio One, BBC Radio Two, Metro, Daily Mirror and The Sun.
#UKPunDay is Britain’s first and only national day celebrating puns, and was founded by Leicester Comedy Festival following the cult success of The UK Pun Championships
The culmination of the day takes place at Leicester Comedy Festival, where comedian Jason Byrne hosts the sixth annual UK Pun Championships; a rap-battle style pun-off, in which budding contestants from around the UK compete for the title of UK Pun Champion 2019. The live show follows the format of a rap battle and takes place in a boxing ring surrounded by the audience who sit in the round. Topics are picked randomly on the night and competitors then take it in turns to pun about that particular topic. Audiences vote for their favourite pun (by way of woops & cheers) and the winner goes through to the next round. After a full evening of pun based comedy, which is billed as a “celebration of Puns”, two finalists then fight it out until a winner is crowned.
The 2019 contestants are:
Robert Thomas, London
2018 winner Rob has been performing comedy since 2010. Three years later, he was a finalist in the Up The Creek "One To Watch" competition and won the Comedy Cafe New Act nigh twice. He was placed 2nd runner up in the UK Pun Championships in 2015 and the Leicester Square Theatre Old Comedian of the Year competition in 2017. He debuted his solo show "Callback" last year, and was London Evening Standard's Comedy Critic's Choice at the 2017 Camden Fringe.
Pun alert: Seaweed is really good for you. If you're ever in trouble, sea kelp.
Twitter: @roblavs
Colin Leggo, Cornwall
Born and raised in the wilds of Cornwall, Colin Leggo is a stand-up comedian and Youtuber who overly enjoys the fine arts of puns and word play. Several of his YouTube videos have gone viral, including "Grand Theft Cornwall", a parody of the well known game and "Cornish Is", made popular by Scott Mills on Radio 1. The channel is home to his popular original series ‘The Car Pun Game’, where he invites well known comedians to drive around, making up puns from words heard on the radio. Guests have included Nick Helm, Pippa Evans and Bec Hill. Nominated: Best Debut Show (Leicester Comedy Festival 2015). Nominated: Best Comedian (What’s On Awards 2015). Colin was delighted to reach the finals of the UK Pun Championships in both 2017 and 2018
Pun alert: I’m a very meticulous amputee, I like to get my prosthetic to always fit properly. Yesterday I was out jogging and my leg came loose. I was kicking myself.
Twitter: @colinleggo
Stevie Vegas, Stirling (Scotland) & Northamptonshire
Stevie has been a Professional Entertainer since 2001 (Juggling with Comedy and Magic). He has written a new joke on Twitter every day for the past few years, so has a collection of around 1500 puns.
Pun alert: Can anyone remind me how to use WD-40? I'm a bit rusty.
Twitter:@SteveJuggler
Eleanor Colville
Writer and performer in the Cambridge Footlights International Tourshow, performing in multiple venues such as the Comedy Store, UCB and Second City. As well as writing the Footlights Pantomime, Eleanor was commissioned last year to write a Charity Pantomime for the Arts Theatre Leicester Square in London's West End (puns-a-plenty). Last year she took her debut character comedy show, Eleanor Colville: Bigamous to the Edinburgh Fringe and enjoyed a sell out run at London Vaults Festival.
Pun alert: Roman Numerals going out of fashion? Not on my watch.
Twitter: @EleanorColville
Adele Cliff, London
Adele has been performing stand up, specialising in one liners, since 2014. She was voted in Dave’s Funniest Jokes of the Edinburgh Fringe in both 2016 & 2017 .She had a successful, sellout, run of her debut hour at the Edinburgh Fringe, was listed in the Dave’s Funniest Jokes of the fringe for the third year running as well as being listed in the top jokes lists of The Evening Standard, The i Newspaper and had a total of 6 jokes listed in The Telegraph’s 65 Funniest Jokes of the Fringe 2018.
As a result of this, Adele was also asked to act as Milton Jones’s tour support.
Pun alert: How can you tell you’re eating a Brexit Christmas dinner? No Brussels, or Turkey and we no longer have a seat at the table.
Twitter: @Adelecliff
Richard Woolford, North London
A performer of prop-based pun comedy since 2012. Richard was a finalist in the UK Pun Championships in 2015 and 2016 where his pun – “Bakers eh? They’re so kneady” was the Guardian review headline. Richard writes social media for Have I Got News For You and puns for BBC Radio 4 Extra’s Newsjack. In 2013 he won £5000 in the Gold UK Christmas joke competition with the pun - What does Miley Cyrus have at Christmas? Twerky and he has been runner up in that competition for the past 5 years. In 2017 his pun – “Why does Donald Trump continuously dress the christmas tree? Because people kept saying moron to him” won the Sky Poll for best Christmas joke of 2017.
Pun alert: I bought my girlfriend some Slinky underwear, now she keeps falling down the stairs.
Twitter: @rwoolfordcomedy
Joseph Murphy
Surreal, musical guy who enjoys wearing tophats. Joe was shortlisted for BBC New Comedian 2015, and New Act of the Year Finalist 2016. He also supported James Acaster.
Pun alert: Why is Moe Sizlack always saying he wants to kill the young Simpson boy? Because he’s a Bart-ender
Twitter:@Musicjoe11
Alf, North Devon
Chris has been performing Comedy since early 2015. His routine is heavily one liner and pun based with a lot of Props and Songs, all with Puns at the heart of them. In 2016 he performed in the 'So You Think You're Funny' Semi Finals in Edinburgh, in 2017 he won the 'Standup for Cider' comedy Competition in Devon as well as 'Bedminster Comedians on the Run' In 2018 he performed at the London palladium on Britain’s Got Talent where he got a standing ovation from the judges and audience and later his appearance was streamed more than 3 million times online.
Pun alert: When I was young I was adopted by a man called Daz, so I grew up referring to him as my Non-biological Father.
Twitter:@whoelsebutalf
Geoff Rowe, Founder and Director of Leicester Comedy Festival, said: “Last year we saw puns trending on Twitter, with everybody from wordplay fans to commercial brands as well as comedians themselves sharing their favourite puns online, while Rob Thomas was crowned UK Pun Champion at Leicester Comedy Festival. We’re delighted to be bringing the national celebration of British puns back in 2019. The best way to celebrate #UKPunday is of course at the UK Pun Championships, but if you can’t be there, be sure to join in online and share your puns using #UKPunDay.”
Now in its 26th year Leicester Comedy Festival 2019 runs 6-24 February. The festival is the longest running comedy festival in the UK, having taken place every February since 1994, and now regularly attracts over 130,000 people to venues across Leicester and Leicestershire. This year there is a brand new sister festival, the UK Kids’ Comedy Festival celebrating the comedy talent of the future. Headline acts for Leicester Comedy Festival 2019 include Jo Brand, Johnny Vegas, Zoe Lyons, Jason Manford, Nish Kumar, Dave Gorman, Russell Howard, Henning Wehn, Jason Byrne, Paul Sinha, Rich Hall, Shazia Mirza, Hal Cruttenden and Gary Delaney.
● The complete Leicester Comedy Festival programme is available now www.comedy-festival.co.uk
● All ticket enquiries: 0116 456 6812
