Montreal salutes Armando Iannucci | Award for Veep creator as Just For Laughs announces festival line-up

Montreal salutes Armando Iannucci

Award for Veep creator as Just For Laughs announces festival line-up

Armando Iannucci is to be given an honour by Montreal's Just For Laughs comedy festival.

The Glaswegian will be named comedy writer of the year for his work on Veep, as he prepares to step down after four Emmy award–winning seasons.

His accolade comes as the festival unveils its line-up today, including Brits Sarah Millican, Russell Howard, Jimmy Carr, Omid Djalili, Danny Bhoy and Gina Yashere.

Millican, Djalili and Bhoy will be performing solo shows – Millican's being billed, strangely, as 'an evening of dry British humour'. Howard headlines the Brit(ish) showcase; Yashere will form part of The Ethnic Show line-up and Jimmy Carr will be appearing as part of The Nasty Show.

The festival – a favourite with the US television industry – will also be honouring Mike Myers with a lifetime achievement accolade at its awards ceremony on July 24.

It will be the Toronto-born comic's first appearance at the event, which celebrates its 33rd year in 2015, performing an 'in conversation with…' show about his comedy career.

Just For Laughs has also created a 'Generation Award' this year, to go to Dave Chappelle, who organisers call a 'modern icon [who] has performed some of the most ground-breaking and influential stand-up shows of his era, and has influenced a whole new generation of comedians'.

Chapelle will be performing six stand-up shows at the festival. His appearances sold out within minutes when he returned to Just For Laughs in 2013 after 13 years.

Kevin Hart will be honoured with the 'comedy person of the year' title. He will be playing the festival on July 25 and setting the record for the festival's biggest individual indoor show, with more than 10,000 tickets already sold for his Bell Centre gig.

Patton Oswald will take stand-up comedian of the year after releasing the Grammy-nominated comedy album, Tragedy plus Comedy Equals Time, and Ellie Kemper will win the breakthrough award for her starring role in Tina Fey's Netflix comedy The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.

In a sign of the times, the festival boasts that its line-up 'has a combined Twitter following of 60 million' when it revealed the star names today.

Other acts making solo appearances include 'Weird Al' Yankovic, Bill Burr, Margaret Cho and Reggie Watts, currently the leader of the in-house band on James Corden's Late, Late Show.

The Off-JFL strand of more alternative acts features Janeane Garofalo, Jen Kirkman, Andy Kindler, Brian Posehn, Rhys Darby, Eddie Pepitone, Kurt Braunohler and more.

And the televised galas that underpin the whole festival will be hosted by Oscars presenter Neil Patrick Harris, Daily Show heir Trevor Noah and Jane Lynch.

The full festival runs from July 8 to 28, with most the English-language programme running in the final week. Website

Published: 5 May 2015

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