Another Keynote Speech

Last year at the Funny Women Awards final I spoke about the need for diversity, inclusion, accessibility and safety in our industry and taking responsibility on behalf of our community. One year on and I used my speech at this year’s final to reflect upon how things have changed since I created Funny Women, exactly 20 years ago this month. This is what I said.

2022 is officially Funny Women’s 20^th year and we’re only just getting the party started!

A bit of history for you. The very first event was held in October 2002 and I went on to launch these awards in 2003. I honestly never thought that what started out as a public relations campaign in response to a male promoter telling me that women aren’t funny, would turn into something that’s taken over 20 years of my life, so far.

We’ve taken on board the challenges of the last few years and found new ways to develop and support new comedy talent. Humour and fun are vital for our mutual wellbeing whether we use them to perform, create or entertain ourselves.

The resilience of the Funny Women brand is amazing and, even in this increasingly diverse and inclusive world, the support we get from across our community regardless of gender, culture, ability, sexuality, ethnicity, and age staggers me. It’s why I keep on going but I don’t do this alone.

I want to pay tribute to the incredible team of producers, writers, web developers, creatives and administrators who work behind the scenes to keep the Funny Women ‘shop window’ looking pukka. And, I give huge thanks to our sponsor, Sky Studios who’ve supported us throughout the pandemic and helped us bring this show fully back to life on this stage tonight.

We are also live streaming this show thanks to our partners, NextUp Comedy who’ve done so much to support us and help create a live online presence which is now a key element of how we run the Awards.

The first year I ran the Awards I did it with the help of some sponsorship from Babycham and employed an experienced comedy producer to manage the entries. We built a basic website and thought we were very cutting edge by having a dedicated mobile phone for the entrants to register! In that first year nearly 70 women competed for one award and now we attract around 1,500 entrants and nominees across five different awards.

How things have changed. Gone are the cascades of printed flyers and posters, now everything you need is on your phone – from our website to entry forms and even the programme for this event.

Comedy is delivered virtually as well as live and we are doing our very best to make the most of today’s hybrid environment to showcase brilliant and talented new performers, writers and creators from all over the world. 

We are embracing this broader global environment with the help and support of our Associate producers in the USA, Australia, Europe and Ireland who encourage entries for these awards and run regional events.

This year we have attracted entries from Romania, UAE, Luxembourg, Estonia, New Zealand, Switzerland, Sweden, Spain, Canada, Italy, Iceland, France, Denmark, Belgium, Germany, Australia, USA, Ireland, Netherlands and the UK.

20 years ago, this was a much smaller world – no Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn or TikTok! You had to ‘dial up’ to send an email and, everything was done on the phone!

Although I’m sometimes nostalgic for the simplicity of the past – social media has enabled the expansion and inclusivity of comedy development and I’m proud that we’re now showcasing some brilliant content creators alongside stage performers, script writers and short film makers.

Some of them perform stand up, write articles and books, or are already influencers in their own right – such is the limitless potential of the social media beast.

Let’s keep a sense of perspective and remember that ultimately there’s nothing quite like the opportunity to perform and entertain people live in the room as we’re experiencing here tonight.  With your support we will continue to feed the broader talent pipeline.

Thank you for spending time with us tonight and enjoy the rest of the show.

If you missed the 2022 Funny Women Awards final at the Bloomsbury Theatre, London on Thursday 29th September, the event was filmed by our friends at NextUp Comedy and you can sign up to watch it here. 

Picture by Steve Ullathorne.