Fife comedian prepares or final of Scottish Comedian of the Year 2021

Richard Pulsford, who lives in Burntisland, will be among nine acts who will be hoping to scoop the title along with the £2000 prize money at the competition final this Sunday in Glasgow.

The Scottish Comedian of the Year competition, held at the Rotunda Club, has previously been won by stars of BBC TV and radio shows including Larry Dean, Mark Nelson, Marc Jennings and Rosco McClelland.

Richard last entered the prestigious competition in 2016, and only reached the semi-finals before.

He explained what taking part at Sunday’s event will involve: “I got through a heat in Glasgow in October and a semi-final in Aberdeen last month,” he said.

"All acts in the final have to perform for ten minutes. As I perform one-liners this means I will have to perform about 35 jokes to fill those ten minutes in front of a panel of judges.

"It would be fantastic to win and be recognised for all the work I have put into my joke writing and all the performing up and down the country over the years. I would also be £2,000 richer!”

Richard explained how he first got into comedy.

“I have always enjoyed watching comedy shows and thinking up jokes. I ended up on stage when I started getting involved in amateur drama productions and after being asked to compere a sketch show I signed up to do a comedy course at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2004.

"At the end of the course we had to perform five minutes of stand-up, which was a terrifying prospect, but once I had done it, I wanted to perform more.”

Since then the local comedian has done hundreds of gigs all over Scotland and England.

As well as performing his own shows and performing at various events including comedy festivals, Richard also runs the Mirth of Forth Comedy agency, which began in 2010, with fellow Burntisland resident, Mark Kisby.

Although shows had to be put on hold as a result of the pandemic in 2020: “The pandemic put paid to all the Mirth of Forth gigs planned for 2020 but now that live events are back we're slowly ramping up again, organising events and taking new bookings.

"We've supported local festivals and organisations such as Rotary Clubs for many years now but also provide comedians for private events and we have a new monthly event starting up at Coady's Bar in Dunfermline in January.”

As well as organising events and taking new bookings Richard has also been busy compiling a new book: “It's called The Punball Wizard. It contains over 600 of my own original jokes, which are one-liners and pun-based jokes, the best from my live gigs or ones which have done well on Twitter. There are some cartoons in there as well. It was launched a fortnight ago.

"I was encouraged to compile a book by a publisher who came to see one of my shows at the Durham Fringe last July.”

People can buy The Punball Wizard from Amazon. For more information about Richard and his gigs visit www.richardpulsford.com.

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