Talent Spotting

Can you guess who next year's breakout prime-time comic will be?

How many long-serving but under-appreciated comedians have started thinking about applying for Britain's Got Talent in recent years, including the sort of people who'd normally never watch that sort of TV? Quite a few, probably, as they see old contemporaries suddenly getting loads of attention and - in the case of this year's winner, Viggo Venn - a not inconsiderable amount of prize money.

For those of us with a decent knowledge of the live comedy circuit, it's impossible to guess which acts, new and old, might star on that show one day. It's tempting to visit a few new betting sites and wager a fiver on an absolutely random name from the old Jongleurs days winning it next year. Maybe do it each way though, as you'd be sick if the unlikely comic you picked got to the final then lost to a group of heartwarming teenage jugglers, or something.

Let's be honest, a lot of comedy fans - busy catching up with so much content elsewhere - only know anything about BGT due to the occasional familiar-to-us comedian who turns up on it. And Susan Boyle, we'd heard of her as well, but that's about it. In fact, there are probably people who were surprised that Viggo was even able to enter, given the name of the show and that he's Norwegian. But then our own Paul Zerdin won America's Got Talent back in 2015, and who saw that coming, beforehand?

It always feels a bit bizarre initially, seeing circuit and Fringe favourites suddenly appearing on such a shiny-floor prime-time event. Viggo's latest show is actually called British Comedian, and he was doing it in a cosy pay-what-you-want venue at last year's Edinburgh Fringe. But then he always had sparks of genius that would work well in a grab-the-attention setting like BGT. It's interesting to see much longer-serving stand-ups make some headlines there too - like Markus Birdman, who made it to the semi-finals this year.

Lots of good comics have appeared on the show in the past, of course - Nabil Abdulrashid, Lost Voice Guy, Daliso Chaponda - and got a big boost off the back of it; they'll no doubt have it on their posters forever. But it does feel like a clash of cultures at the time, two long-serving live comics in this year's semis, as if Viking Stavanger and Brighton and Hove Albion both qualified for the latter stages of the World Cup Finals, somehow.

And good luck to them. It's not easy getting any sort of a foothold on TV these days, as even that perennially useful showcase Mock The Week is now an ex-show (although interestingly we've exported that to the States now too). It's clearly worth a go if you can brave all the glitz and schmaltz and the potential for humiliating failure, that these shows revel in. Even success can be a double-edged sword, as tabloid reports of the final felt obliged to include a few negative responses from fans of the other acts involved.

But that's high-profile competitions for you. If anyone can handle stick, it's a stalwart stand-up.