Tim Harding reviews the final

The LGBTQ+ New Comedian of the Year final has wisely downsized this year from the Clapham Grand and into the Comedy Store, which proves the ideal venue for a final of extremely polished and capable acts.

The format is a bit more shiny-floor than most comedy competitions too, inspired partly by The Voice and partly by Drag Race, with cameras everywhere broadcasting the show for NextUp (and later organiser Comedy Bloomers’ YouTube channel) and four celebrity judges in spinning chairs – Chloe Petts, Josh Jones, Tia Kofi and James Barr. 

After their sets, the acts stay on stage to receive live feedback from the judges, which seems mad until you realise that none of the judges will say a single negative word for the whole night. Josh Jones says they should treat it as a celebration – getting to the final means you’ve already won.

Host Ciara O’Connor did a tremendous job, buoying the crowd’s energy just enough to launch the acts, low-key enough that she didn’t overshadow anyone, and wisely dripping a little venom into proceedings in the second act with a set slagging off Ariana Grande – a welcome note of sourness.

First on of the contestants was Michael McPheat: confident, relaxed, dressed like Fred from Scooby-Doo – which is a note that everyone made in their little notebooks before McPheat pre-empted it with a joke of his own. A former goth who grew up in Milton Keynes, he couldn’t relate to the negative emotions of goth music, and made a hard pivot into being a cheerful guy from the 1970s instead. As an opening act, he set the tone very nicely; on any other bill he would have been more distinctive.

Willow Marler, a trans woman with blue hair and neon knitwear, introduces herself as ‘J.K. Rowling’s sleep paralysis demon,’ the first in a set comprised almost entirely of killer one-liners, delivered with the relaxing efficiency of Gary Delaney. 

There’s the makings here of an incredible club comic. She was the consensus pick and took home first prize, less because she clearly outshone the other acts and more because she just edged it in terms of laughs per minute. A worthy winner in a night full of potential worthy winners.

Donna Williams is an older lesbian from the rough part of Barnsley, one of three acts on the bill to go double denim, she was ‘instantly familiar,’ per judge Tia Kofi, and had a tough but warm set of stuff about coming out in the early 1990s, ‘when you still had to meet women at Screwfix,’ and about her more traditionally femme mum, who must have been very puzzled to find herself raising a cynical butch lesbian.

Will Burke was a personal favourite, an excellent joke-writer with a more understated style, pairing his arch, slightly fusty delivery with his patterned jumper and ironed grey slacks. He reminded me of a less shit-eating Fin Taylor, letting his delivery recede a little so that his punchlines landed with greater force. 

The judges thought he was destined for a great career in writing rooms, which I thought underrated his performance a little, although he clearly wasn’t brimming with the same confidence that animated some of his rivals.

This was thrown into even sharper relief by Sam Hickman closing the first half, sweeping onto stage in a sparkling purple gown and cape festooned with butterflies, and holding a harp. Unmatched for glamour, she owned the room like Liz Taylor, following an acidly camp routine with some delightful Disney princess trilling on the harp – clearly a very talented lady, and very funny too, although she perhaps committed a tactical error by devoting most of her five minutes to describing her friend’s weird kid. 

The material wasn’t bad at all, but felt a little anonymous compared to her eye-catching stage persona. She was great off the cuff, demanding ‘Do you love me??’ from the judges before they’d had a chance to speak.

Opening the second half, 28-year-old Caz Thorne held up the side for cynical denim lesbians, although like Donna Williams before her, there’s a warmth that shines through at every opportunity. Another very relaxed, professional and stageworthy set, her down-the-middle approach got a little lost amongst the big personalities although the material was solid, and delivered with a veteran’s confidence.

One such personality was Marco Devalier, a tall, clean-cut Filipino boy in a pink linen suit and silk scarf, clearly intent on making a splash. 

‘Accent from America, passport from France and gonorrhoea from Milton Keynes,’ he boasted in his aspirational set, mainly about dating older men. He was the only act to bring a couple of props along for his gags, and won respect from the judges for back-referencing material from the other sets and throwing in a little light crowd work. 

Although largely very effective, if you were going to split hairs you might say that his delivery was a little stilted, with the air of somebody who’d been practising in the mirror a lot.

You can rely on this competition for some intriguing fits, and Scout Robertson was maybe my favourite of the night, pairing a schoolboy shirt, tie and shorts with heavy eyeshadow and a floor-length red fur coat. 

He’s clearly lived a life as well: his set was partly about growing up gay in Glasgow and partly about the ulcerative colitis diagnosis that eventually left him with a stoma bag and a sewn-up anus – an even greater tragedy for a gay man, as he’s quick to point out.

Robertson peppered his set with fantastic one-liners, and seemed to promise a number of rich seams to be explored in a longer timeslot, earning the runner-up prize for his performance but leaving the field open for Josh Jones to steal the biggest laugh of the night: ‘Losing my arsehole is my biggest fear – I don’t know how I’d pay my rent.’

I’ve seen Ro Dodgson before, but they’re going from strength to strength with a punchy, muscular set mostly focused on their appearance (‘what the fuck has happened to Ed Sheeran?’) and their status as a ginger, disabled, non-binary autistic person. Another act with great confidence and pacing, they’ve found a fruitful comic persona in this contrasting of vulnerability with a kind of tough, Artful Dodger-type attitude.

Finally there was Alex Farrell, with another set that would have podiumed on any other night. He’s a dyspraxic gay Scouser who ‘spends a lot of time with his nan,’ and is notable on this occasion for the number of tangents he manages to cram into a five minute set, also being bold enough to taper off for comic effect where the rest of the group has been smashing punchlines all night. 

The lack of polish is illusory, as he was consistently funny across the five minutes, but it made a nice change from the slickness of the competition. Josh Jones was right though – if they’ve made it this far, they’ve already won.

Review date: 11 Nov 2026
Reviewed by: Tim Harding
Reviewed at: Comedy Store