Jimmy Carr hosts a preview of Amazon's new show

In Amazon’s Last One Laughing, comedians are put into a reality TV-style ‘house’ and challenged to keep a straight face while other contestants try to make them crack.

And, says Jimmy Carr, the format plays into stand-up’s strengths as ‘we’re competitive and we don’t like our colleagues to be funny’.

He hosts the UK edition of the international format, which drops next week, and hosted a London preview screening last night, attended by many of the comics taking part.

Carr admitted that it was ‘strange to be working for Amazon’, adding: ‘A soulless, capitalist, dubious money-making machine… but Amazon still thought I was the man for the job.’

Last One Laughing is based on a Japanese original, prompting Carr to joke: ‘Amazon are continuing their policy of supplying cheap knock-offs from Asia.’

And he quipped that he couldn’t have taken part himself as he’d have failed a drugs test – for too much botox.

At the screening at Underbelly Boulevard were Roisin Conaty, who acts as Carr’s sidekick, and contestants Bob Mortimer, Judi Love, Sara Pascoe, Lou Sanders, Joe Wilkinson, Harriet Kemsley, and Richard Ayoade  as well Katherine Ryan – who isn’t in the show, but was lending support to her frequent screen colleagues. 

However Ayoade didn’t watch the show with the others – instead choosing to read his book (Absolute Beginners by Colin MacInnes, if you’re interested).

‘I still haven't seen it, because of psychological problems,’ he said afterwards. ‘But well done, everyone. I have a strong policy about seeing my own face, and it's a no for me.’

Mortimer admitted that he, too, hadn’t watched the episodes because ‘I don’t like seeing Richard’s face either.’

Ayoade, who likened to the show to a ‘hostage situation’,  also exposed a fakery scandal on set… as it was equipped with a kitchen, but with pans incompatible with the induction hobs there. ’In a way the whole thing was a lie,’ he joked.

Love said Ayoade was an analytical player. ‘He saw what your weaknesses were and just went for it.’ 

In contrast, Sanders was told she was ‘incredibly aggressive’ in trying to get the other comics to laugh, to which she replied: ‘I played the game how I make love!’

Meanwhile, Love explained her technique not to crack up: ‘I just ate all the way through, because I had to have something in my mouth and it weren’t a Friday so it wasn't gonna be a fucking dick.’

And Carr joked that at the screening Wilkinson looked like ‘a homeless guy that's been cleaned up by the church’.

Last One Laughing will premiere on Prime Video on March 20.

Published: 11 Mar 2025