Winners of competition to support Billy Pearce announced

Up-and-coming stand-up comedians Tony Cowards and Joe Hart have won a competition to appear on the Bloomsbury Theatre stage in front of a large audience.

The comics will each been given 20 minutes stage time to warm up the audience ahead of veteran Billy Pearce's comeback performance.

Pearce, who was a regular on the circuit in the 1980s and 1990s and won a British Comedy Award in 1994, says: "It was great to see so many entries for the competition to support me at my show at The Bloomsbury Theatre on Saturday 26th October.

"We had so many good acts to choose from that we decided to give two comedians the opportunity to perform on stage. I really enjoyed both Joe and Tony's routines, and look forward to seeing them warm up the crowd at The Bloomsbury later in October."

Wiltshire-based Tony Cowards, who has been performing since 2004, says: "I'm delighted to have won. I'm really looking forward to supporting a fantastic comedian like Billy and having the opportunity to perform at the Bloomsbury Theatre."

Here is the video that Cowards entered into the competition:

Southampton-based Joe Hart is relatively new to comedy, having recently taken part in the Chortle Student Comedy Award. He said: "I'm so thrilled to have been picked! I'm going to be doing comedy in a proper theatre, opening for a proper comedian. I found the news so great I removed the word 'wannabe' from 'wannabe comedian' on my Twitter profile!"

Here is the video Hart submitted to the competition:

The show will take place on Saturday 26th October 2013 at the Bloomsbury Theatre. Tickets