Theatre News

Top ten Fringe one-liners revealed by public vote

Stewart Francis has topped a public vote, hosted by TV channel Dave, to find the best jokes thrown up by this year’s Edinburgh Fringe.

The one-liner “You know who really gives kids a bad name? Posh and Becks” garnered the best response from voters.

It was followed by Tim Vine, who featured highly in last year’s poll as well, coming second with “Last night me and my girlfriend watched three DVDs back to back. Luckily I was the one facing the telly.”

Both Vine and Francis featured again in the top ten – chosen from a shortlist of 30 compiled for Dave by a team of comedy critics – scoring sixth and eighth place respectively.

Will Marsh, Rob Beckett and Lou Sanders – the only woman in the top 10 – also made leaderboard appearances.

Here are the results in full:

1) Stewart Francis: “You know who really gives kids a bad name? Posh and Becks.”

2) Tim Vine: “Last night me and my girlfriend watched three DVDs back to back. Luckily I was the one facing the telly.”

3) Will Marsh: “I was raised as an only child, which really annoyed my sister.”

4) Rob Beckett: “You know you’re working class when your TV is bigger than your book case.”

5) Chris Turner: “I’m good friends with 25 letters of the alphabet… I don’t know why.”

6) Tim Vine: “I took part in the sun tanning Olympics – I just got Bronze.”

7) Toby Williams (as Dr George Ryegold): “Pornography is often frowned upon, but that’s only because I’m concentrating.”

8) Stewart Francis: “I saw a documentary on how ships are kept together. Riveting!”

9) Lou Sanders: “I waited an hour for my starter so I complained: ‘it’s not rocket salad.”

10) Nish Kumar: “My mum’s so pessimistic, that if there was an Olympics for pessimism… she wouldn’t fancy her chances.”