Brendon Burns is to host the ITV4 coverage of FHM magazine’s quest for the best new stand-up comedian, which launches today.

The contest offers a £10,000 cash prize – as much as the Foster’s Edinburgh Comedy Award – to the best new act, chosen after five regional heats and a final.

Entrants have to send a link to their two to three minute audition clip, along with 25 words on why they think they should win, to standup@fhm.com by September 13.

Competition organisers said: ‘The tape can be professionally filmed or self-shot in front of the bathroom mirror – so long as it’s funny.’

The six-part TV series, to be made by Steve Coogan’s production company Baby Cow and Signal TV, will be broadcast later this year.   It follows a successful pilot in February hosted by Ed Byrne and won by Marlon Davis.

Burns said: ‘One of my favourite things about my job is working with new comics, not as some sort of “expert” but as someone that made a lot of mistakes early in my career.

‘Stand-up is hard, really really hard and takes years to perfect, but once in a blue moon you find a freak that just knows how to do it from the offset. We're looking for that freak. This a great gig for me and one that I'll cherish, I'm properly chuffed.’