Stand-up honoured by Montreal's Just For Laughs festival

Mae Martin is to be named rising comedy star of the year at Montreal’s Just For Laughs festival.

The Canadian comic, mostly based in the UK, had already been named as the host of one of the event’s major gala shows and will now pick up the honour at an awards show on July 28.

Martin recently won series 15 of Taskmaster, and wrote and starred in the Channel 4/Netflix comedy series Feel Good, which aired in 2020 and 2021. Their second Netflix comedy special, Sap, was released in March.

Also being honoured by Just For Laughs are Abbott Elementary creator Quinta Brunson, who will be named comedy person of the year; party-loving stand-up Bert Kreischer – one of the world’s highest-grossing live comedians – who will be named stand-up of the year; and Daily Show correspondent Ronny Chieng, who will be named breakout comedy star of the year, ahead of his appearances in Hulu’s adaptation of the novel Interior Chinatown.

The festival has also today announced a raft of industry events as part of its ComedyPRO series.

They include a showcase of Variety magazine’s 10 comics to watch for 2023 – which includes Irish stand-up Joanne McNally, as well as Hannah Berner, Kurtis Conner, Zarna Garg, Ian Lara, Leanne Morgan, Nimesh Patel, Brian Simpson and Sabrina Wu.

Also on the programme are:

• A star-studded read though of some of the favourite scenes from Airplane!, followed by an ‘in conversation’ event with writer-director David Zucker 
• A cast event with the stars of Killing It – including Craig Robinson   and Claudia O'Doherty  – as it returns to Peacock for a second series, The comedy about snake-hunters was previously shown on E4 in the UK.
• A screening of Hulu series This Fool and  a conversation with its stars, Chris Estrada and Frankie Quiñones.  
• A panel from Canadian sketch comedy show The Dessert.
• In conversation events with  Ramy Youssef  and the  Please Don't Destroy trio of Ben Marshall, John Higgins and Martin Herlihy, who have have made the leap from digital shorts to feature-length film.
• Podcast recordings including The Downside with Gianmarco Soresi; Let’s Make A Sci-Fi ; StraightioLab; Kill Me Now with Judy Gold; My Momma Told Me ; Steph Infection:; What’s Up Fool; The Best Hang Podcast and Phone a Friend with Jessi Cruickshank.

ComedyPRO runs from July 26 to 29, as part of the wider Just For Laughs programme. Festival website.

Published: 22 Jun 2023