The Comedy Bureau Field Report Ep. 38: Jill Paiz-Bourque & Big Business in Comedy Live-streaming

BBC Comedy Association to Revive New Comedy Awards & Appoint a “Young People’s Comedy Laureate”

December 16, 2020

bbc, boots riley, chappelle's show, i'm a virgo, jill bourque, new comedy awards, rushtix

The proliferation of virtual comedy due to the COVID-19 pandemic would naturally bring about the creation/transition of entire platforms/venues/etc. in order to serve a gradual mass exodus of comedy, for the time being, into the live-streaming sphere. Jill Paiz-Bourque founded RushTix to serve that exact purpose and has done quite well with building and creating a premium comedy live-streaming platform that aims to be a destination for comedy fans and those in dire need of that connection that they would get at any sort of live show (but especially in live comedy). Jill zooms with TCB’s Jake Kroeger to detail RushTix rise to putting on comedy live-streams that boast thousands of attendees as well as get in “hot” takes on Chappelle’s Show being taken off HBO Max, BBC’s new New Comedy Awards, and Boots Riley getting the green light for his new series I’m a Virgo.

Follow @RushTix across socials & visit RushTix.com for schedule/tickets/info & follow Jill @jillbourque on Twitter.

The Comedy Bureau @thecomedybureau across platforms and please, please support TCB via GoFundMe, Patreon, or on Venmo (@jakekroeger).
Produced by Jake Kroeger
Music by Brian Granillo
Artwork by Andrew Delman and KT

« February 2021 »

December 15, 2020

News

bbc, bbc comedy association, new comedy awards, young people's comedy laureate

Just over the weekend, the BBC’s BBC Comedy Association announced the plans for the next year and going forward with the rebooting their New Comedy Awards, a comedy competition dedicated to finding new talent. It has been off the air since 2006, but it will be brought back to UK audiences (and, hopefully, us Yanks via some streaming service?) as part of a fresh commitment by the BBC to “promote inclusion and representation”.

New comedy talent getting a legit chance on TV or just a set of awards dedicated to comedy is hard to come by these days, so we’re intrigued at what this new version of BBC’s New Comedy Awards will bring in the coming year.

Additionally, BBC Comedy Association Controller of Comedy Commissioning Shane Allen announced that a Young People’s Comedy Laureate will be appointed next year to head up outreach for workshops, masterclasses, and the like all around the UK. From the looks of it, we’re guessing that’ll be a UK comedian of note, but we’re also excited to see who that might be. After all, Fleabag had its TV roots at the BBC.

Seeing what comes of this, maybe U.S. based networks/streaming services will have to do better than another season of Last Comic Standing or Bring the Funny.