Kev takes Leicester Comedy Festival title

Kev Mud has been crowned UK Pun Champion for 2024 at the Leicester Comedy Festival.

Gags he cracked at last night’s event in De Montfort Hall included:

• ‘I can't go to the toilet without taking candles. I'm a party pooper’

• ‘I was at a kid's party and they said, "There's an ice cream man outside" but by the time I got out there he had melted.’ 

• ‘What do Pompeii and Kim Kardashian have in common? Nobody would have heard of them if it wasn't for their massive ash.’

Saying he was proud to have taken the title, Mud added: ‘ don't usually write puns and I've only been going for just over a year, but comedy has given me the chance to make a lot of people laugh, and what's better than that?’

And of why he entered the contest, he said: ‘I live in a caravan and I couldn't turn down a night of free heating.’

Also taking part in the final, hosted by Jason Byrne, were Daniel Edison, Kat Dellar, Adam Dorr, Bennet Kavanagh, Kev Mud, Mary Cross, Pauline Eyre and Rabiah Coon.

The UK Pun Championship  has been running since 2014 and last year’s winner Lee Brace attended the show to handover the championship belt – originally designed and commissioned by Cornish stand-up Colin Leggo, who took the title in 2019. 

Michael Harris-Wakelam, chef executive of the Big Difference Company,  which runs the Leicester Comedy Festival, said: ‘Is there anything more uniquely British than a pun? 

‘The UK Pun Championships is one of the events that we know everyone in our comedy community marks their calendar for. It’s often seen as a specialist area of comedy, but the joy of puns is that they are so easily delivered and remembered and so anybody can have a go and join in.'

Published: 13 Feb 2024