Tonight Izzy Askwith was announced as the winner of the prestigious and most visible Stage Award in the final of the 2020 Funny Women Awards hosted by 2014 winner, Jayde Adams.
Izzy Askwith competed with seven other acts live on stage at the world-famous Comedy Store London to take the title. Eryn Tett and Mary O’Connell were awarded second and third place respectively.
It is a joy for Funny Women to be able to create some good news in a year that has been extremely challenging for the live comedy industry and this year’s competition, which launched on 1st April during lockdown, has been run virtually due to COVID-19 restrictions culminating in a live show behind closed doors which was streamed in real-time to registered
ticket holders. There was no audience and only the acts, judges and crew were in the venue.
“The Funny Women Awards are an important and vital annual celebration of female comedy talent, so despite the restrictions imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic we are very proud to have run the competition throughout lockdown by taking our activity online.” says Lynne Parker, Funny
Women founder and CEO. “Women make a huge and valuable cultural contribution to the comedy industry and this year’s cohort of new talent has been no exception.”
Now in their 17th year, past winners and finalists of the Funny Women Awards have gone on to become household names. These include Katherine Ryan, Zoe Lyons, Jayde Adams, Desiree Burch, Sara Pascoe, Sarah Millican, Susan Calman, Rachel Parris, Bridget Christie, Kerry Godliman, Diane Morgan and Roisin Conaty.
Eight finalists out of 320 entrants to this year’s Stage Award were selected by a panel of industry judges following 10 virtual heats and two live online semi-finals where the acts performed from their own homes over Zoom.
Congratulations to Izzy Askwith, Eryn Tett and Mary O’Connell!
