Pun-loving comedian Darren Walsh has won the award for the funniest joke of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in his first full-length show.
Walsh, a former animator, won the award for the line: “I just deleted all the German names off my phone. It’s Hans-free.”
While it is not his first time at the Fringe, Punderbolt is the 39-year-old’s first full hour-long show at world’s biggest arts festival.
“It’s great and I wasn’t expecting it so it’s a real surprise,” he told The Independent. “The award seems to be gaining traction. People are maybe appreciating one-liners and puns a bit more.”
While his line won the top prize, he believes there are funnier jokes in his show. These include: “My cat is recovering from a massive stroke” and “Green men make me cross”.
Walsh gave up being an animator for advertising and education purposes to do comedy five years ago and has written more than 2 500 jokes since. “I cherry-picked a few for the show, and whatever topic the audience thinks I should joke about, I riff on that.”
10 best Edinburgh jokes
1: Darren Walsh “I just deleted all the German names off my phone. It’s Hans-free.”
2: Stewart Francis “Kim Kardashian is saddled with a huge arse… but enough about Kanye West.”
3: Adam Hess “Surely every car is a people carrier?”
4: Masai Graham “What’s the difference between a ‘hippo’ and a ‘Zippo’? One is really heavy, the other is a little lighter.”
5: Dave Green “If I could take just one thing to a desert island I probably wouldn’t go.”
6: Mark Nelson “Jesus fed 5 000 people with two fishes and a loaf of bread. That’s not a miracle. That’s tapas.”
7: Tom Parry “Red sky at night. Shepherd’s delight. Blue sky at night. Day.”
8: Alun Cochrane “The first time I met my wife, I knew she was a keeper. She was wearing massive gloves.”
8: Simon Munnery “Clowns divorce. Custardy battle.”
10: Grace The Child “They’re always telling me to live my dreams. But I don’t want to be naked in an exam I haven’t revised for…”