Vintage year for comedy - and for youngest star

THE American comedian Bo Burnham, who turned 20 during this year's festival, yesterday became the youngest ever nominee for the Fringe's top comedy award.

Inspired by European and Australian performers - many of them major festival names - he launched his Edinburgh debut this summer, after becoming an internet sensation at home. The Foster's Edinburgh Comedy Awards, sponsored by the Australian beer brand for the first time this year, broke new ground on several fronts yesterday, in its 30th year.

Imran Yusuf, a 30-year-old Muslim comedian and former video games worker, became the first free Fringe show to be nominated for the festival's top comedy awards, as one of six on the Best Newcomer list. Meanwhile, the five top names nominated for the main Best Comedy Show award yesterday included two women for the first time, Josie Long and Sarah Millican. Both had previously won the Best Newcomer prize.

The awards producer, Nica Burns, said: "Two fantastic 30th anniversary shortlists reflect the enormous changes in the comedy landscape. It took a very impassioned, intense debate to select the nominees from an extremely strong and diverse long list - 2010 will be remembered as a vintage year for comedy."

Burnham has been seen as a festival phenomenon this year. His comic videos have brought tens of millions of hits on the YouTube site, but he is up against formidable competition for the 10,000 prize from Long, Millican and the two men - Greg Davies from TV show The Inbetweeners and Russell Kane.

Imran Yusuf, who has performed some 500 comedy shows in the past three years in his determination to build a stand-up career, has played to a room for about 50 people in the Laughing Horse Free Fringe. He was nominated for the Best Newcomer prize, worth 5,000.

He said his afternoon show, An Audience with Imran Yusuf, worked from the premise that "regardless of what you look like, who you are, or where you come from, what ultimately defines us is our behaviour".

Yusuf was meeting agents and producers yesterday for career "strategising" after a string of top reviews and the awards nomination. Yusuf was one of six names in contention for the Newcomer slot, including Asher Treleaven, Gareth Richards, the sketch group Late Night Gimp Fight!, Roisin Conaty and The Boy With Tape On His Face, played by comic Sam Wills.

Laughing Horse director Alex Petty, with more than 300 free shows on his slate, said: "It's pure stand-up, quite autobiographical, he always performs with a huge amount of energy.

"It's a first nomination for the festival and any free shows. It's something myself and the performers are immensely happy with. It means you can do a free show and get a nomination."

And the nominees are...

BEST COMEDY SHOW

Bo Burnham: Words, Words, Words

Josie Long: Be Honourable!

Greg Davies: Firing Cheeseballs at a Dog

Russell Kane: Smokescreens and Castles

Sarah Millican: Chatterbox

BEST NEWCOMER

Asher Treleaven: Secret Door

An Audience with Imran Yusuf

The Boy with Tape on his Face

Gareth Richards: Stand Up Between Songs

Late Night Gimp Fight!

Roisin Conaty: Hero, Warrior, Fireman, Liar