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" genuinely prestigious affair... with a genuine sense of occasion." Chortle

" the best-attended competition final in comedy" Chortle

"no-one can deny the sense of excitement and occasion that this annual event now generates" Scotsman

"the Scottish Comedian of the Year final looms ever more influentially in the stand-up calendar" The List

"there’s no denying it will be a night to remember" The Skinny

("SCOTY) does attract some major talent to the contest" The Skinny

"a great showcase" The Skinny

 

What the Press said 2008

http://www.chortle.co.uk/shows/misc_live_shows/s/16808/scottish_comedian_of_the_year_final_2008/review/ Alan Anderson, the promoter behind the Scottish Comedian Of The Year, is keen to stress that his competition is not just open to new acts. Theoretically Frankie Boyle or Billy Connolly could rock up to the back room of a Helensburgh pub to try to win their place in the final. While that’s never going to happen, it means a playing field that’s about as level as the Cresta Run – with stand-ups who’ve been around for a decade pitted against those with just a fistful of gigs to their name. The flip side is that the final attracts the crowds. With around 750 eager punters rammed into Glasgow’s Old Fruitmarket, this is probably the best-attended competition final in comedy, making it a daunting gig for those nervous newbies. First up was The Wee Man, returning to the final for a third year with his squawking caricature of a Glaswegian ned, complete in ‘Fuck Yeez’ T-shirt and obligatory Burberry cap. In the interests of disclosure, I should mention that at last year’s event he directed much of his set at me, bitterly berating his unflattering Chortle review inches from my face… so there was some measure of apprehension before he took to the stage. This time around we did get to see a more generally usable set, even if the results were still hit and miss. He takes some very easy pot-shots at the Americans and the English, and leans heavily on aggression and swearing to provoke a reaction. The character, too, is one-dimensional, with little apart from his accent to set him aside from several similar archetypes on the circuit. But there are glimpses that he could be better than this, such as a nice gag about the poverty line being draw around his house and an entertaining bit of business about the difference between a golfer and a threat to national security being down to nothing more than the angle of your baseball cap. Just when I thought I was off the hook, The Wee Man scuttled over to the judges’ table again and…. well, let’s just say his kissing is as sloppy as his dress sense. Graham Mackie certainly cuts a distinctive figure on stage, which he acknowledges with an endearing icebreaker about resembling an off-duty Santa. It’s typical of the hugely likeable style that pervades his relaxed set. A few self-deprecatory fatty gags reinforce that impression, as does his instinctive way of interacting with the audience, just enough to make this feel like a dialogue. It’s most likely a technique he learnt at school, for by day he is a woodwork teacher in Govan, and he has a few entertaining tales about pupils playing hooky and forging notes from their parents to show for it. But he’s also got rather too many old, unoriginal jokes to fully capitalise on his charming affability. Young Aberdonian Andy Learmouth, too, has a strong, confident presence undermined by patchy material. After a few trite openers, he got quickly launched into more assured material remembering a teenage crush, when he was 50 per cent incurable romantic, 50 per cent incurable pervert. A couple of strong lines follow on the Scottish in London, but he runs out of steam – and gags – and ends with a whimper, not with a bang. Shame, as he has some promise. Although still in his twenties, Teddy’s been on the Scottish scene, on and off, for a decade, which explains his ease on stage. He still looks wide-eyed and naïve, but don’t let that fool you – behind the slightly daffy smile is some viciously hard-edged material. He’s a strong gag writer, and even when tackling subjects as seemingly tired as Heather Mills, he can find a new angle that’s not dependent on the obvious. The material – aptly enough, given the night – is heavily Scottish skewed, but with an appeal that would travel south of the border, if he chose to. Controversial Socialist Tommy Sheridan is the butt of a particularly fine routine, and the entire city of Glasgow gets an affectionate pasting, too. His often sick material won’t be to everyone’s taste, but he doesn’t care, and skilfully rides the audience’s apparent disgust at some of the darker lines, ordering them to just ‘toughen up’ and live with it. Such confidence, backed with pin-sharp lines, earned him second place in the final reckoning. Scott Agnew, the unabashed ‘big poof’, was an audience favourite even before he’d uttered word one. And when he did get going, he cemented that tide of goodwill with an enthusiastic performance sweeping away any pockets of audience reticence. Like Teddy, some of his material drew shrieks of outrage, and he too, just batted it away, taking any squeamish reaction in his sizeable stride. When it comes to comedy, he has got a one-track mind… it’s all about his sexuality and people’s reactions to it – especially in the sectarian quarters of Glasgow, which gives his content an extra edge. He’s no mincing queen, nor does he mince his words, making for a bold, brash, barnstorming performance in which he’ll describe in hilariously graphic detail the logistical challenges of a gay threesome rather bitch camply about some showbiz figure. Such a powerhouse set rightly earned him the Scottish Comedian Of 2008 title. Twenty-year-old newbie Jeff Brighton was floored by his own inexperience. There’s a couple of nascent good ideas in his set, but he just looked so out of his depth in such a big room. He starts off with a weak bit of toilet humour, immediately striking the wrong note, and much of his subsequent material is jumbled and unfocussed, limply hitting familiar ground about incest in small communities and poor-quality supermarket clothes. As if to illustrate that chunk of material, he wears an ill-fitting lumberjack shirt on stage; but he wears his own personality just as uncomfortably, which doesn’t instil confidence. That said, there are a few crafty touches to his presentation, such as the impression of his mother or an ‘Irish’ waitress he encountered, that does show a knack for out-of-the-box thinking. A couple or three years on the circuit might yet see him right. Iain Stirling is another rookie 20-year-old with a bad choice of opener, doing some gags about his long hair… that he unfortunately no longer has, making the comments reduntant. But once he moved on to the meat of the set, things looked up, with enjoyable descriptions of the horrors of the Megabus and of being brought up in a caravan, as told through his clearly fabricated teenage diary. He’s got an innate sense of timing, with perfect pace and phrasing to enliven the routine, but ten minutes seemed something of a stretch, as he wound up with some tired material about Gillian McKeith, whose pooh inspections make her the easiest of targets. She might deserve every bit of flak she gets, but he needs to find a way of doing it with more flair. Carly Baker, the only female finalist, was born and raised in Missouri but has lived in Scotland long enough to qualify tonight. She’s a solid, but unspectacular act, fitting the stereotype of the slick and confident American – but with no stand-out lines to remember. There’s some obvious stuff about the transatlantic translation of the word ‘fanny’, a bit of banter about her divorce and lots, and lots of sex talk. Comparisons with if.comedy best newcomer Sarah Millican, who covers similar ground, are almost inevitable, but Baker comes off by far the worst, as she has little of Milligan’s idiosyncratic guile or charm. Baker’s not bad, and passes the time amiably enough, but she’s just not brilliant either. Keir McAllister started with similarly undistinctive fare: talking about ginger people and mining national stereotypes about the arrogant English and the relentless upbeat Australians, seguewaying into some Steve Irwin comments that are so old hat it’s almost nostalgic to hear them again. But he’s got an appealing delivery, so the audience stick with him. And it pays off, as the second half of his set is in a different league from the first, the turning point coming with an observation or two about the William Wallace memorial. After this, the fire in his belly ignites, and he becomes violently vicious about Lady Thatcher, to the obvious delight of the audience. They’re less pleased with his sick jokes about Jordan’s son, but McAllister again uses the outrage to his advantage. He came third on the night, and if he could have been judged on the second half of his set alone, could possibly have done better still – though Teddy and Agnew would always have provided stiff competition. Lastly, another newcomer, Rab Brown – a name you’re sure to hear more of. He is a talented writer, producing wonderfully descriptive prose to channel his disgust at the garish hen-night ‘slags’ who infest every city centre, every weekend. The strike rate’s high, he has a well-defined grumpy-young-man point of view and his delivery assured for someone so relatively inexperienced. He only lets himself down at the end of the set with a cheap bit of comedy erotic dancing, jiggling his sizeable frame to Kelis’s Milkshake. Such easy laughs are beneath someone who can write as well as this. He won the Wee Scoty award for the best newcomer. A bit of tidying up, and he could easily be in with a shot at one of the main positions next year. As long as Frankie Boyle and Billy Connolly don’t enter, of course. Reviewed by: Steve Bennett September 29, 2008

http://news.scotsman.com/arts?articleid=4539667 Published Date: 27 September 2008 By BRIAN DONALDSON COMEDY SCOTTISH COMEDIAN OF THE YEAR OLD FRUITMARKET, GLASGOW WHO'D be a judge at an event such as the Scottish Comedian of the Year? Last September, the beaks seemed to get their voting papers in a right old fankle when the top three was announced, inexplicably allowing some fine stand-ups to shuffle backstage in the also-rans corner. This year, they steered far away from controversy island by plumping for Scott Agnew, Teddy and Keir McAllister, a trio patently head, shoulders, knees and toes above the rest. The only question was who would scoop the top prize of £1,000, gigs at the Glasgow International Comedy Festival and in Australia and the wonderfully crafted banana boots trophy? When a clearly crestfallen Keir McAllister took to the stage in receipt of his third prize, the yells of "winner" from a portion of the crowd may have helped him dry his eyes in the liquor-sodden aftermath. The permanently rosy-cheeked Teddy appeared more accepting of his second-placed fate as the massive (as in tall and soon to be very famous) Scott Agnew made up for last year's disappointment with this proud victory. With Teddy asking his audience to "toughen up" as he applied for the post of Official Comedian of the Taliban, Agnew discussing being a gay Catholic performing to a crowd of Orangemen while exposing the impracticality of threesomes, and McAllister launching an increasingly hysterical tirade against the proposed state funeral for Thatcher, there was very little to split three comics with mighty stage presence and impressively high punchline ratios. Special mention should also be made of the hottest newcomers among the ten: Rab Brown with the most surreal set, and Ian Stirling created a hilariously grotesque tableau of caravan life. Host Janey Godley just about managed to staple proceedings together, no thanks to an awkward-squatter in the front row, while 2006 winner Mark Nelson provided a snapshot of the spectacularly gruesome wit that deservedly earned him that inaugural gong. Whether you approve of this bear-pit making and breaking of comedy dreams, no-one can deny the sense of excitement and occasion that this annual event now generates. And on the back of last year's litany of injustice, only the foolhardy would argue that the judges got themselves into another fine mess.

. http://www.list.co.uk/article/12926-scottish-comedian-of-the-year/  The List (Issue 613) 18 September 2008  Jay Richardson STAND-UP COMPETITION Approaching its third anniversary, the Scottish Comedian of the Year final looms ever more influentially in the stand-up calendar. Inspired by Manchester’s City Life contest – won by the likes of Peter Kay, Chris Addison and Caroline Aherne early in their careers – the SCotY is open to all-comers, with eight regional heats and a semi-final dictating the ten hopefuls competing at the Old Fruitmarket. Despite the winner pocketing £1000 and the chance to gig in Australia, arguably the most important prize is the opportunity to deliver an hour’s show at the Glasgow Comedy Festival in March, an incentive that boosted previous winners Mark Nelson and Sean Grant to greatly enhance their material, the latter performing a 30-minute set at the Edinburgh Fringe barely a year after commencing stand-up. Both finals to date have courted controversy and critics cite the Scottish Comedian of the Year title as unreflective of the many established acts who don’t enter. But you have to be in it to win it, and as the contest’s reputation has grown, so has the quality of the entrants, with seven of last year’s beaten finalists returning for another crack in 2008. Among this year’s judging panel are Sanjeev Kohli and Jane McCarry, better known as Naveed and Isa from Still Game, the irrepressible comedian Stu Who?, Alan Tyler, head of comedy and entertainment at BBC Scotland, and Steve Bennett from comedy website Chortle. One final place in the final remains for the winner of the Grand Gong Show at Maggie Mays in Glasgow on Thu 25 Sep.

http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/features/Serious-competition.4534210.jp Serious competition Published Date: 27 September 2008 By BRIAN DONALDSON IT APPEARS THAT THESE DAYS YOU can't turn on your telly without seeing some celebrities slipping on the ice or messing up at the Proms in order to get a prize. Despite the sense that it's difficult to compare like with like, stand-up comedy is not short of tournaments. While many have fallen by the wayside (The BBC New Comedy Award, Daily Telegraph Open Mic and Dubble Act Award for three), some regionals are going strong (the north-west of England and Leicester both hail their comics of the year), Funny Women is fairly self-explanatory; though the rather more confused Richard Pryor Award gave up the ghost after one ceremony. Meanwhile, the daddy of them all, the Perrier, morphed into if.comedy three years ago. The cult of the competition is truly upon us. Yet, a gap was spotted in the market by Alan Anderson, a Scottish comic who started promoting gigs while studying in Manchester. "I saw comedians like Alan Carr, Jason Manford and Justin Moorhouse grow up through the City Life Comedian of the Year competition and saw what it did for their careers," he recalls. "So when I returned to Scotland I wondered why there was nothing like that here." Through Ha Ha Comedy, his company which has produced and promoted stand-up in Scotland since 1998, Anderson finally realised his ambition to get a Scottish Comedian of the Year tourney up and running in 2006. "I felt it was important to celebrate Scottish comedic talent. Every August we welcome the world's comedians into the country yet much of the time, audiences don't have a clue who they are but they see 'winner of such and such' and they go to those shows. We don't shout enough about how good our own talent is." Anderson felt that someone needed to redress the balance and start recognising the nation's best cultural export. "What I'd noticed was that Scottish comedians were taking part in all these UK-wide competitions, but as soon as they got to the latter stages, the London audiences didn't get the cultural references and the judges thought they were being too parochial. These were people making a fantastic living in Scotland but falling down at the last hurdle." After a series of regional heats in Glasgow, Aberdeen, Kilmarnock and Helensburgh, Mark Nelson was crowned the inaugural champ. His prize was glory, some cash and a gig at the 2007 Glasgow Comedy Festival. "I know some people think it'll be a disaster if they don't win, but for me it was just a bonus." Nelson's concerns only crept in once his CV bulged with the words "Scottish Comedian of the Year". "The title is a bit misleading and I got more worried about having this title than thinking 'this is suddenly me set on the road'. I think I became better known through word of mouth and I eventually got to support Andrew Maxwell at the Glasgow Comedy Festival." Doubts over the title is merely one of the elements that bugs the competition's highest profile critic, Tommy Sheppard, head honcho at The Stand. "I think it's wrong for people to set something up as the 'Scottish anything' unless there's a demonstrable case to be made that it represents the world as it applies to their particular discipline. If it was the Ha Ha Comedian of the Year or Alan Anderson's Comedian of the Year, fine, not a problem, but to call it the Scottish Comedian of the Year is a misnomer and does a disservice to all the people who aren't entering. It's entirely self-selecting, a competition of those who choose to enter it which is a small proportion of the people plying the trade of comedy in Scotland." Anderson shrugs off Sheppard's criticisms. "I think the success of the competition speaks for itself; it's something that the comedians and audience and the industry feel is a good thing. Why is it that we cannot celebrate and give awards to comedians that are out there?" But is the title misleading? Would some people not hear it and imagine that Frankie Boyle or Jerry Sadowitz have been on stage slugging it out for that crown? Anderson has no qualms about the name. "It was never for year one or year two; the title is for a competition that I see will run for decades. As the competition grows it will grow into the title. It's open to all so if Frankie Boyle or Billy Connolly wanted to enter they would be welcome." For Sheppard, the way to develop the next era of Scottish comedic talent is not through the tense and divisive nature of a competition where acts are judged on a performance lasting up to ten minutes but through nurturing stand-ups at Red Raw, The Stand's weekly showcase for fresh talent in both Edinburgh and Glasgow. "It offers ten spots for newcomers every week. The Scottish Comedian of the Year suggests to a young kid that this is a potential big break to stardom as though it's The X Factor. But it doesn't work that way because your eight-minute spot you practise for a competition is not a good apprenticeship. Making the leap from that to 20 minutes is the hardest thing in the world." Still, come tomorrow night, the ten finalists (including circuit comics such as Teddy, Scott Agnew and Keir McAllister) who will be aiming to succeed last year's victor Sean Grant will probably care little for long-term development and will be focused on simply giving it their best shot. Whether anyone will leave thinking they've seen the next Big Yin is another matter. • Scottish Comedian of the Year, Old Fruitmarket, Glasgow, tomorrow.

http://www.theskinny.co.uk/article/43951-haha-comedy-crowns-scottish-comedian-of-2008 'Ha Ha Comedy' Crowns Scottish Comedian of 2008 Written by: Lizzie Cass-Maran Published: Mon 29 Sep 2008   Scotland's latest comedy hopeful wins the chance to perform in Australia The comedy community breathed a sigh a relief last night as comic Scott Agnew scooped the top prize in HaHa Comedy’s Scottish Comedian of the Year 2008, following last year’s controversy over accusations of injustice and bias amongst the judges. It was a tough call for this year’s judging panel; a larger group than last year, comprising some of the UK’s leading comedy performers, promoters and journalists. Whilst there was no doubt as to the top three acts, deciding a winner was a hard task, as there was a hair’s breadth between Agnew, second place winner Teddy and third-runner Keir McAllister. Agnew wins £1,000 in hard cash, his own show at the Glasgow Comedy Festival and a trip to Australia, with the vague though hopeful promise of "an opportunity to perform"’ there. Cash prizes were also won by Teddy, McAllister, and new act Rab Brown who won the inaugural ‘Wee SCOTY’ award which is reserved for acts performing less than two years.

http://www.theskinny.co.uk/article/43828-haha-comedys-scottish-comedian-of-the-year Written by: Lizzie Cass-Maran Published: Sun 21 Sep 2008 Ha Ha Comedy presents its competition final at Glasgow’s Old Fruitmarket, amid continuing controversy over it’s legitimacy. The Scottish Comedian of the Year contest is with us once more. This annual competition is open to everyone from Joe Open Spot to Billy Connolly; the only criteria is that you must come from, or base yourself in, Scotland. Winners have been chosen from audience votes at heats across the country, and finalists will perform in front of a panel of judges at the grand final at the Old Fruitmarket in Glasgow on 28 September. It is rapidly becoming one of the key dates in the year of Scottish Comedy. Last year's final has even been nominated for Best Traditional Event in the Scottish Event Awards. The success of the competition is certainly a major coup for promoter HaHa Comedy, but let’s hope that no publicity is bad publicity. Last year’s final, whilst being hailed by Chortle as a "genuinely prestigious affair... with a genuine sense of occasion", had it’s ‘genuineness’ questioned by many members of the comedy community. The event even prompted the management company behind The Stand to release a press statement reiterating their condemnation of comedy contests in general and of SCOTY in particular, claiming that “it would be wrong to allow this masquerade to dupe those not in the know into thinking this contest had some universal acclaim or acknowledgement”. What does give HaHa Comedy the right to style this event, which is ostensibly a PR and money-making exercise for the company, ‘Scottish Comedian of the Year’? There have certainly been some big names involved with the contest – Fringe regular and critically acclaimed Janey Godley, Stu Who, a veteran and well-loved Scottish comic with a myriad of TV and radio credits under his belt, and Des Clarke, one time presenter of SM:TV Live. These contestants would certainly make the contest worthy of its name. The thing is, these aren’t contestants. These are the judges and comperes. Acts who have passed the stage in their careers where they need to enter competitions in an attempt to gain credibility or respect. Previous SCOTY winners Mark Nelson (2006) and Sean Grant (2007) may be hardly a blip on the radar in comparison to Scottish comedy’s real 'big names', but they have undeniably been offered amazing performance and development opportunities as part of their prize. First prize this year includes £1,000 in cash, flights to and performances in Australia, and the winner’s own show at the Glasgow Comedy Festival. This fortunately does attract some major talent to the contest, many keen merely for the chance to perform at the Old Fruitmarket. With some indisputable and hard-earned talent in old pros such as Keir McAllister, Scott Agnew and Teddy on the bill for this year’s final (alongside more obscure and questionable acts), there’s no denying it will be a night to remember. May the best act win. But if they don’t, keep an eye out for those who didn’t. Those who may not be willing to sacrifice their originality to appeal to the lowest common denominator. Those with, in all probability, a solid future in Scottish comedy.

http://www.ayrshirepost.net/entertainment-ayrshire/entertainment-news/2008/09/12/girvan-comedian-laughing-to-success-102545-21714430/ Girvan comedian laughing to success Sep 12 2008 HAVE you heard the one about the young Girvan comedian who went to Kilmarnock for a laugh? Well, he got loads of laughs, and ended up winning the latest heat of Scottish Comedian of the Year.Jeff Brighton, 20, was clear winner from six stand-ups in the café bar at the Palace Theatre.Instantly-likeable Jeff fumbled onto the stage, and muttered to the audience about where he should put his glass of water and mic stand.He shared stories about his nerves and lack of bowel control, before launching into a routine about the trials of coming from Girvan, shopping in Asda, and trying to woo unattractive Polish women.Jeff also did a rather unflattering impersonation of his mum, Ellen, before pointing her out to everyone, seated in the third row! A reviewer for Scottish Comedian of the Year said: “Jeff could be compared to a young Peter Kay.“But he has developed a style of deconstructing his material much like the late great Chic Murray.“The audience adored him, and towards the end you could see that Jeff was really enjoying himself as he realised he couldn’t put a foot wrong.”Not bad for a young man who was doing only his seventh stand-up performance.Jeff said: “I went to Edinburgh to enter the So You Think You’re Funny competition at the fringe.“And I reached the semi-final stage there.”The experience boosted Jeff’s confidence ahead of the latest competition. And he came out on top against more experienced opposition: a Liverpudlian, a Canadian, two Scots men, and one Scots female, who had perhaps the crudest act of the evening. But Jeff isn’t going down the road of blatant crudity.He said: “I prefer a kind of innocent brand of humour, quite a lot of it based on life in small-town Girvan. But I hope it’s done with affection, and I don’t think Girvan people would take offence.”Jeff has been writing his own material for about a year. And this clearly prepared him well for his stand-up debut in June this year. As well as life in Girvan, he has drawn on his experiences as a waiter and caddie at Turnberry Hotel.Jeff also has a radio show on local station Girvan FM, and is about to take a degree course in broadcasting at Paisley University.He admitted: “I do feel a bit sick before going out on stage, but once I’m there I love it. It’s what I really want to do, and I’ll give it my best shot.” Modest Jeff says he doesn’t expect to win the Scottish Comedian of the Year title.“I’ll be happy to go down well and get noticed in the final.” The final takes place on Sunday, September 28, in Glasgow’s Old Fruitmarket.

http://www.kilmarnockstandard.co.uk/entertainment-kilmarnock/entertainment-news/2008/09/05/homecoming-gig-for-kilmarnock-comedienne-81430-21661126/ Homecoming gig for Kilmarnock comedienne Sep 5 2008 by Stef Lach, Kilmarnock Standard FUNNY girl Kim Griffin is psyching herself up for a hometown gig that she hopes will earn her a place in the final of a prestigious comedy competition. Kim, 20, will be performing in the Kilmarnock heat of the Scottish Comedian of the Year show tomorrow night (Friday, September 5) at the Palace Theatre. The Killie lass is the only girl the bill, but that won’t put her off in the slightest. The stand-up comedienne said: “Last year I entered when I was just starting out in comedy so this time I’ll be a bit more prepared for it. “It’s always great playing a gig in your hometown but it will definitely be nerve-wracking. “The Scottish Comedian of the Year gigs are always great fun and well organised.” The former Standard columnist is up against other local acts Jeff Brighton, Roddy Fraser, Wade Mcelwain, James McInally, Andy Vaughan and the Wee Man. The overall winner goes straight into the Glasgow final at the end of September while the runner-up advances to the semi-final. The show starts at 8pm and tickets, which cost £7 and £8, are still available. Call the box office on 01563 554900.

 

What the Press said 2007 Merchant City Festival: Minister For Fun Beverley Lyons And Laura Sutherland September 25 2007 THERE will be a lorra laughs at the Ha Ha Scottish Comedy Awards on Sunday. BBC's Des Clarke is hosting the big show to find Scotland's Comedian of the Year as part of this year's Merchant City Festival in Glasgow. Organisers have revealed there's another special guest to present the big banana boots trophy in the form of Scottish Culture Minster Linda Fabiani. Organiser Alan Anderson said: "It shows the Scottish Government acknowledges one of our greatest exports. We're sure she's got a good sense of humour." http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/entertainment/therazz/daily/tm_headline=merchant-city-festival-minister-for-fun&method=full&objectid=19823326&siteid=66633-name_page.html   Comedy title up for grabs September 21 2007 THE new Scottish Comedian of The Year will be named this weekend. Culture Minister Linda Fabiani MSP will present the award to this year's winner after the grand final at the Old Fruitmarket on Sunday evening. The Big Banana Boots trophy will go to the best of the 10 comics on the bill, part of the Merchant City Festival. Each will perform before a panel of industry judges in an event being hosted by Scots comedian Des Clarke. Alan Anderson of promoters Ha Ha Comedy, said: "The Scottish Comedian of The Year event is our way of celebrating one of the nation's biggest assets - its humour. "We've been world leaders in making people laugh for years from Harry Lauder and Chic Murray to Billy Connolly and Rory Bremner and we want to formally celebrate it. "We're delighted that Linda Fabiani has agreed to present the prize to our eventual winner and it shows that the Scottish Government acknowledges one of our greatest exports. "Every year we welcome the best comedians from across the globe to perform at the Fringe. However it is rare that we ever give ourselves a pat on the back for being entertaining, engaging and funny hosts." http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/news/display.var.1704694.0.comedy_title_up_for_grabs.php   Comedy Preview: Scottish Comedian Of The Year JAY RICHARDSON September 20 2007 Comedy at this year's Merchant City Festival has a distinctly homegrown flavour, with standout acts including veteran comic and breakfast host Fred MacAulay and skilled young Kevin Bridges appearing at the Old Fruitmarket and Tron respectively on Saturday. Online phenomenon-turned-live performer Limmy fronts two shows at Blackfriars on Thursday, but with both likely to sell out, why not sample the Stand Up Drink Up! pub crawl with Alan Anderson and Scott Agnew the same evening, beginning at Lauries Acoustic Room? The weekend's highlight though will surely be the Scottish Comedian of the Year contest. Distinguished by the shoddiest trophy ever spray-painted, last year's inaugural competition witnessed a slender victory for Mark Nelson over Paul Pirie. Following a series of heats across Scotland, this year's line-up of emerging talent includes the assured Agnew, returning finalist and bampot the Wee Man, amiable Aussie Ro Campbell, Teddy, one third of ramshackle sketch trio the Amazing B*******, sassy Jay Lafferty, National Service advocate Sean Grant, occasionally surreal Northern Irishman Niall Browne, crowd-baiting Scott Forbes and wild-card Aberdonian entry Gus Tawse. One spot remains open to - potentially - anyone as it's for the winner of tonight's Gong Show at Maggie May's. Des Clarke hosts and the prize money is £1000. http://www.theherald.co.uk/goingout/choice/display.var.1697778.0.0.php Comedy Preview: Scottish Comedian Of The Year The horribly talented and charming Des Clarke hosts the final, where a celebrity judging panel will decide who is Scotland's funniest person. The lucky winner will take away £1000 and a look of smugness that'll make everyone hate them. 'Part of the Merchant City Festival 2007' www.list.co.uk/event/153397-scottish-comedian-of-the-year-grand-final/

SCOTTISH COMEDIAN OF THE YEAR ***
OLD FRUITMARKET, GLASGOW

 HEARD the one about the Greenock gal, the Granite City geezer and the Govan guy? They took the top three slots in the Scottish Comedian of the Year competition in the face of patently superior opposition! Boom boom!! Funny? Very nearly. Such big decisions are often at the mercy of a select bunch, and the panel (including Janey Godley, Chortle website's Steve Bennett and the Record's showbiz investigator) certainly had a tough job picking a top three, never mind a winner, from a largely impressive shortlist of nine. How could they have got it so wrong?

There was no place for The Wee Man, the sole character act on show, a Ned with attitude (all of it bad), whose attempts to physically ingratiate himself upon the judges sadly failed. Scots-based Ulsterman Niall Browne had an easy-going professionalism and a neat trick in pulling out diamond material from potentially hack subject matter such as IKEA and Irish terrorism, but he too somehow failed to step on to the winners' podium. The estimable Teddy might have nabbed a bronze medal had he veered from his single-stream sex confession, while the 6ft 4in stridently non-camp gay comic Scott Agnew will surely have his moment in the sun at a later date.

Instead, the panel gave third to the laconic Gus Tawse (an Aberdonian whose material is drier than a mackerel enjoying its third day on a Dubai washing line), with Jay Lafferty (the Greenock comic with a hard line in incest, rape and paedophile gags) as runner-up, leaving Sean Grant to be pronounced the Scottish Comedian of the Year. The least experienced stand-up of all the nominees, Grant had perfectly passable material about ugly children and ASBOs, but his victory proves that, at the very least, they really need to change the name of this award to accommodate the word "New".

http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/s2.cfm?id=1529602007

GOVAN-BASED IT specialist Sean Grant, who only took up performing when asked to do a best man's speech last year, was named Scottish Comedian of the Year at a contest organised by Ha Ha Comedy as part of the Merchant City Festival.

Compere at the event in the Old Fruitmarket, Des Clarke, pictured at foot, turned to one of the judges, Radio Scotland producer Margaret-Ann Docherty half way through the evening and asked: "You work for the BBC, Margaret-Ann, so presumably you know the winner before the votes are even counted?"

Thai-ing the knot
NOT all the finalists were gritty working-class funsters from the central belt. In third place was Aberdonian Gus Tawse, who came out with the age-old comedy line: "My wife doesn't understand me."

But then added: "Which is odd, as the website said she had conversational English. What a waste of 100,000 baht."

www.theherald.co.uk/features/diary/display.var.1711505.0.figure_of_fun.php

SCOTLAND'S top funnymen, and women, went head-to-head at the Scottish Comedian of the Year awards in Glasgow.

Host Des Clarke joined Janey Godley, Culture Minister Linda Fabiani and The Razz to judge the contenders. Govan's Sean Grant won - and picked up £600, a touring contract with Ha Ha Comedy and a banana boots trophy.

Glasgow ned The Wee Man was up for an award, but burnt his boats by slagging off the audience then threatening head judge Steve Bennett.

www.dailyrecord.co.uk/entertainment/therazz/daily/tm_headline=sean-s-the-gov%26method=full%26objectid=19841983%26siteid=66633-name_page.html