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Nick Helm

Date of birth: 01-10-1980

As a stand-up Nick Helm is known for his brash style, overcompensating for hidden insecurities, while to a wider audience he is known for the BBC Three sitcom, in which he plated lead character Andy in the BBC Three sitcom Uncle, which ran from 2014 to 2017. He also had his own show on the channel, Nick Helm's Heavy Entertainment, in 2015.

After several years coming to the Edinburgh Fringe with friends, Helm broke through with his 2010 solo show Keep Hold of the Gold, and its 2011 follow-up Dare to Dream, which was nominated for the Edinburgh Comedy Award. He was nominated again in 2013. In 2015, he won the Chortle Award for best music and variety act.

As well as countless panel show appearances, Helm had recurring roles in the 2017 Channel 4 sitcom Loaded, about an internet start-up, and Sky’s series The Reluctant Landlord, created by and starring Romesh Ranganathan.

Nick Helm: My dad wrote my award-winning joke

Comic comes clean about his Edinbugrh Fringe accolade

comedy It has been 14 years since Nick Helm won the Dave award for the best joke of the Edinburgh Fringe.

And now it can be revealed that he actually got the gag from his father.

The comic came clean about the origins of the joke – ‘I needed a password, eight characters long, so I picked Snow White and the Seven Dwarves’ – on Radio X this morrning.

He told presenter Toby Tarrant: ‘I’d say he gave me the slab of marble, and I used my skills as a comedian to chisel it down into an award-winning sculpture!"

‘My dad wrote a very long, rambling email with that joke in it, and I edited the email and I said, "It's not like that, dad, it's like this."

‘And it was like this three-paragraph story that ended with the punchline, and I rewrote it for him.’

‘I had 60 one-liners in all of my previews, and I'd whittle them down, and the ones that didn't get laughs, I'd cut them out, and then I whittled it down, and it was one out of six, because I only need six jokes for my shows. I do six jokes.

‘I never really thought that much of it. And then it got picked out, and then it won an award.’

Tarrant was sitting in for Chris Moyles Show on his 6.30am to 10am weekday show on Radio X and on Global Player.

Published: 24 Apr 2025