This event has now taken place. Thank you to everyone who attended. We hope to return in late 2025 - sign up to our mailing list for any news.
Saturday 16th March 2024, Holborn, London
A day of advice, insight, networking, and opportunity to help you build and sustain your comedy writing career
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What
British Comedy Guide is delighted to announce a fourth Big Comedy Conference will be held in Central London on Saturday 16th March 2024, bringing together a wide range of expert speakers from across the industry to talk about their craft. Session details
When
Starting at 9am and focusing once again on comedy writing, ticket holders can look forward to an enlightening, challenging and, crucially, extremely useful day in the company of a plethora of hugely successful industry professionals.
Refreshments and lunch are included in your ticket price, and after the final session in our fully accessible venue concludes you're invited to join us at a privately hired pub where networking and chat can continue until late with wonderful food and drink.
We look forward to seeing you in London! Any questions?
Sessions
Headline speaker
We are delighted that comedian, actor and writer Lee Mack will be joining us to talk about his work, experiences and discuss the shape of the contemporary comedy scene.
Industry update
Join a group of top executives and commissioners to discuss the comedy landscape across British TV and radio in 2024. They'll address a range of topics, including current commissioning briefs and updates; schedules; and changes and challenges within the industry. This panel will give you an unparalleled insider's view on where the industry is - and where it's going.
Writers and agents
Anecdotes offer entertaining insight - into someone else's past. But what about your future? In this session we are joined by working comedy writers and agents to discuss the practicalities of the industry today and what you might expect in the future. From the realities of working daily as a professional scriptwriter to finding and securing work, getting an agent, when, and how, this panel promises a wealth of invaluable wisdom.
Producers
Producers are often the gateway to the broadcast comedy industries - and are certainly their lynchpin. Our panel for this session will talk more about what this sometimes mysterious role actually involves, how they work with writers, developing new talent, finding that talent in the first place, and offer more insight from their unique perspective about the realities of today's television and radio industries in Britain.
Avenues to success
Writing a hit sitcom may be the ultimate aim for many, but it's highly unlikely to be the first line on your CV. From podcasts to social media, gag-writing and sketches to the radio and other non-narrative formats, this session delves into the wide variety of ways to navigate the comedy waters, develop your skills, find collaborators, find fans - and get noticed by those all-important gatekeepers. It may just open your eyes to a pathway you'd not previously considered.
2024 panellists and hosts
Andy Townsend
Andy runs Long Road Talent, a management agency representing screen writers and writer/performers across all their creative endeavours. His clients include Gemma Arrowsmith (Horrible Histories), Mike Bubbins (Mammoth), Kyla Harris (We Might Regret This) and Alice Fraser (D'Ancey LaGuarde). His roster of writers and performers have many TV projects currently in development.
Ben Wicks
Ben has run the Comedy Entertainment (now called Entertainment) department at Expectation since 2017, overseeing the creation, development, and production of shows including: double BAFTA, and RTS winning, The Lateish Show With Mo Gilligan, RTS and BAFTA winning The Big Narstie Show, RTS winning and BAFTA nominated Munya Chawawa's Race Around Britain, Mel Giedroyc: Unforgivable, Joel Dommett's In With A Shout, Backstage With Katherine Ryan, Katherine Ryan: Parental Guidance, and Jimmy Carr's I Literally Just Told You. Prior to all that he was exec of the multi-BAFTA nominated and multi-RTS winning The Last Leg for its 5 formative years and exec on Alan Carr's Specstacular, SP on Harry Hill's Tea Time, and producer of double-BAFTA winning A League of Their Own, BAFTA winning The Revolution Will Be Televised and did a ten year stretch on Have I Got News For You.
Charlie Perkins
Charlie is Head of Comedy at Channel 4. She joined the multi-award-winning department from Blink Industries where she was Head of Comedy, co-producing cult comedy series Don't Hug Me I'm Scared. Beginning her career working on shows such as French & Saunders and Mock The Week, she became a producer at infamous alternative comedy venue The Invisible Dot, for BBC radio comedy and at Cave Bear Productions. Founder of the Bristol Revunions and The Paddock comedy collective, she is a co-founder of the Live Comedy Association and founder of the Free-Free Movement.
CJ Rock
CJ is an associate agent in the film & TV department of industry leading literary agency Casarotto Ramsay & Associates. CJ joined Casarotto in 2020 as an assistant to senior agent Abby Singer; today Abby and CJ represent a broad range of writers, directors and producers working across both film and television, from BAFTA and Emmy award winners to exciting new talent. Prior to working at Casarotto, CJ worked at both the Park Theatre and the Boulevard for Julie Clare Productions, and formerly for the NHS in the mental health care sector in South Wales.
Ged Parsons
Ged is an award-winning comedy writer, working mainly in topical satire. He's been part of the core writing team for Have I Got News For You since 1999, and did all 17 years of Mock The Week. He wrote for the original Spitting Image, Top Gear, Room 101, and The Big Breakfast, and for David Frost, Les Dawson, Joan Rivers, Mel Smith and Griff Rhys Jones, Rory Bremner, Bob Mortimer, the Two Ronnies, and the One John Cleese. He enjoys compiling lists, and name-dropping. He received the Sony Radio Academy Silver Award for BBC Radio 4's My Teenage Diary. He contributes to Private Eye magazine, is a question-writer for TV quiz Only Connect, and his latest credit is for bits of stuff on Radio 4's award-laden news-mix, The Skewer.
Georgy Jamieson
Georgy is a broadcaster, podcaster, and event host. She writes for British Comedy Guide, is one of the directors of The British Comedy Society and has appeared on radio and TV as a comedy historian. Her recent interviews on stage include An Evening with John Cleese and An Afternoon with Steven Berkoff.
Gina Lyons
Gina is an award-winning scripted producer who produced the pilot for In My Skin, which won a BAFTA Cymru award, and Dreaming Whilst Black, which was nominated for an International Emmy. Gina has just finished producing a 10-part comedy series with Big Talk Productions for CBS/Amazon Freevee called Dinner With The Parents, the US remake of Friday Night Dinner, after having associate produced 10 episodes of Breeders for Avalon/Sky/ FX. Gina has a small label called Gobby Girl Productions with a slate of TV shows from mostly unrepresented writers.
Jason Cook
Jason is an award-winning stand-up, screenwriter, executive producer and actor. His writing and production credits include Gold’s highest rated show to date, Murder On The Blackpool Express, Death On The Tyne, Dial M For Middlesbrough, two series of Murder, They Hope, Blood Actually, and a further feature length TV movie from the same franchise set to air in late 2024. Beginning his journey into television with his autobiographical series for BBC Two, Hebburn, he has also written for Miranda, and his own Radio 4 series, Jason Cook's School Of Hard Knocks.
Jon Holmes
Jon is a multi award-winning writer, presenter, producer, and boss of indie production company Unusual. His Radio 4 comedy The Skewer (also now adapted into a short film on BBC iPlayer) has notched up shelf-loads of international awards including Gold for Best Comedy at the UK Radio Academy Awards three years running. He's hosted his own shows on BBC 6Music, Xfm, 5Live, LBC, Radio X, Virgin and (a long time ago when he was young) Radio 1. He's since covered Saturday mornings and weekday breakfast on Radio 2, and worked on TV with the likes of Armando Iannucci and Harry Hill. He co-created Radio 4's Dead Ringers, and has won BAFTAs for his work on TV's Horrible Histories.
Josh Cole
Josh is head of comedy at BBC Studios Productions and executive producer of multi-award-winning programmes including Good Omens, Inside No. 9 and Trying. Further recent shows include Black Ops, Here We Go, A Whole Lifetime With Jamie Demetriou and Two Doors Down. Previously Josh was a commissioner at Sky responsible for commissions including Sally4Ever and Breeders.
Julia McKenzie
Julia is Commissioning Editor of Comedy and Entertainment at BBC Radio 4, as such she commissions dozens of comedy shows on a yearly basis which are a range of formats from sitcoms and comedy drama to sketch, satire, stand-up and panel. Recent critically acclaimed hits include the sitcom Call Jonathan Pie, One Person Found This Helpful (Frank Skinner hosting) and Icklewick FM.
Katie Storey
Katie is an experienced comedy writer with numerous credits across television, radio and live comedy. She is a regular contributor to topical shows such as The Last Leg, Have I Got News For You, The Now Show and The News Quiz. Her recent credits also include Glenn Moore's Almanac (Radio 4), The Unofficial Science Of... (Sky), Stand Up To Cancer (Channel 4) and Mel Giedroyc: Unforgivable (Dave). She has a number of her own projects in development too, including a feature film script and a scripted pilot for BBC Radio 4.
Lindsay Sharman
Lindsay has worked as a performer, writer and theatre producer. She has created seven original Fringe shows, garnering a raft of 5 star reviews, and toured the country in both her own and others' productions. In her collaboration with Laurence Owen, she has written five theatre productions, including the award-winning Cinemusical. Lindsay is the writer and director of various podcasts, including Mockery Manor, which was shortlisted for a comedy prize in the BBC Audio Awards 2024.
Lucy Lumsden
Lucy is MD of Yellow Door Productions, recent shows include Ruby Speaking with Jayde Adams, The Cockfields written by Joe Wilkinson and David Earl and The Mysterious Case Of Agatha Christie starring Anna Maxwell Martin. Prior to setting up her own company, Lucy was Head of Comedy at Sky for 6 years, commissioning over 60 series. Before Sky she was Controller of Comedy Commissioning for BBC for 4 years.
Lyndsay Fenner
Lyndsay worked for BBC Comedy for 12 years, starting out in television before moving to radio where she produced a wide slate of audience and non-audience sitcoms, stand-up, topical comedy, panel shows and sketch shows. She now co-runs production company Mighty Bunny, with recent credits including James Acaster's podcast sitcom Springleaf, stand-up show Jessica Fostekew: Sturdy Girls Club, and topical format Catherine Bohart - TL;DR.
Nana Hughes
Nana is Head of Comedy at ITV. A BAFTA, RTS & Broadcast award-winning comedy executive producer, prior to joining ITV she was Head of Comedy at Talkback and Head of Development at Retort, where she exec produced Chewing Gum. Her projects for ITV and ITVX include: award-winning Changing Ends, Deep Fake Neighbour Wars, Count Abdulla, Ruby Speaking, Significant Other, The Family Pile, Plebs: The War and, most recently, G'wed.
Nathan D'Arcy Roberts
Nathan is an award-winning screenwriter, stand-up, and actor. He has been twice nominated for the BBC New Comedy Award and has won the BBC's prestigious Felix Dexter Bursary. Nathan has written several successful short films. His most recent, Lemons, starring Jordan Stephens, premiered on Sky Arts as part of Sky's Comedy Shorts collection. His BFI-funded short, Blind Spot, starring Ben Bailey Smith, is currently screening at festivals around the world.
Nerys Evans
Nerys is a creative director at Expectation. She has worked on award-winning shows including Alma's Not Normal, In My Skin, Guilt, Intelligence and The Change whilst at the production company. Previously she was Deputy Head of Comedy at Channel 4, where she commissioned series including Catastrophe, Derry Girls and The Windsors. Before that she worked for BBC Comedy where she produced Miranda, Jonathan Creek and French & Saunders.
Pete Strauss
Pete is an award-winning executive producer at BBC Studios Audio. He's worked across multiple shows during his time at BBC Studios including Rhysearch, Laura Smyth: I Don't Know What To Say, The Now Show and BBC Radio Fjord. Before that, he was the co-creator and head writer of The Stand Up Sketch Show for ITV2.
Rosie Holt
Rosie is an acclaimed comedian, actor and satirist, whose popular videos of her playing an MP on social media have achieved more than 7 million views. She is the host of the Aria nominated podcast Noncensored, and has been seen/heard on The Russell Howard Hour (Sky Max), Friday Night with Niall Paterson (Sky News), BBC Radio 4's The News Quiz, DMs Are Open, POV, Please Use Other Door and Ashley Blaker: 6.5 Children. Rosie is about to go on tour with her show That's Politainment!, to which the Observer gave 4 stars, and has a book coming out - Why We Were Right by Rosie Holt MP in July.
Simon Nye
Simon's writing career encompasses translations, novels, television sitcoms and dramas, adaptations, animation and film. He translated books before turning to fiction, adapting his two novels Men Behaving Badly and Wideboy for the small screen. He won a BAFTA for Just William. Other credits include The Crown Jewels, Tommy Cooper: Not Like That, Like This, How Do You Want Me?, The Larkins and The Durrells.
Stu Richards
Stu is a writer/producer/director type behind sitcom series like BBC Three's Jerk and Comedy Central's Bobby And Harriet Get Married, as well as some pilots that never made it due to things like pandemics and not being good enough.
Toussaint Douglass
Toussaint is one of comedy's most exciting talents. Joyfully absurd and charmingly awkward with deceptively subversive writing, in a short space of time he has firmly established himself as both a writer and performer to look out for. His writing credits include Late Night Mash, Have I Got News For You, The Russell Howard Hour, Mock The Week, Bamous, Famalam, Ant & Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway, The Now Show, Dead Ringers and James Acaster's Springleaf: A True(ish) Crime Podcast.