Russell Peters: My joke thief claims were 'a prank'

Backtrack over Trevor Noah comments

Russell Peters has done a U-turn on his claims that new Daily Show host Trevor Noah stole his material – saying his baseless comments were just a ‘prank’.

The Canadian made the accusations of joke thief during an interview at the weekend, when he was asked about Noah and said bluntly: ‘He [is also a thief above it all.

‘He has stolen material from David Kau, he's stolen material from myself, you know, whatever - that's his gig now. Congratulations.’

The comments were made on Singapore TV station Channel News Asia – but follow-up questions to his representatives from the media went unanswered.

However three days later, as the story has spread around the world, Peters tweeted that he was only having a joke - and accused the media of being ‘gullible’ for taking him at face value.

He tweeted to Noah: ‘OMG: I can't believe how gullible the media are! Next time I'll choose a less awkward time to prank U!”

Noah, who was was the support act for Peters on his 2007 tour of South Africa, appears to have taken it in good spirits, tweeting back: ‘You just cost me the presidency of South Africa. See you in Vegas. Revenge is sweet.’

But this is not the first time Noah has been accused of being a joke thief, as Kau made similar comments during South Africa’s first ever comedy roast in 2012.

In an interview in response to those claims, Noah said there was no evidence that he had lifted a specific routine or gag.

‘Nobody owns comedy, nobody owns a premise, nobody owns an idea,’ he said, suggesting the accusations stemmed from the early days of stand-up in his homeland when ‘everyone had their little niche thing… one guy was doing the coloured jokes and one guy was doing the political stuff and one guy was doing the cerebral stuff and one guy was doing the American stuff, but now when the market gets filled up with more comedians, you don’t own that thing anymore.

‘This is what all the guys just didn’t understand; they were like: “No, that’s mine! I’m the guy who tells the jokes about the government!” And we’re like, “No, everyone tells jokes about government.”’

Here is Peters making his ‘joke thief’ comments: