![\"Edinburgh](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/fb8fa441ebfa001e97c481f1978e3cf3.jpeg\"\/)
<\/p>\nComedian Matt Forde has said the cost of performing at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe means that comedy is \u201cbecoming more elitist\u201d in the UK.<\/p>\n
Forde, 42, who presented political satire programme Unspun, said the \u201cEdinburgh model\u201d is making it \u201calmost impossible to become a working-class, successful comedian in this country\u201d.<\/p>\n
Giving evidence to a Commons select committee on the live comedy sector, he said: \u201cA lot of comedy clubs, the money has gone backwards since when I first started gigging. The money has got worse.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople face higher costs and less money for the work that they\u2019re doing, and then, really, until the birth of TikTok and social media, the main way really to get discovered as a comedian, to really get a career on the whole \u2013 and this isn\u2019t true for everyone \u2013 was to really have a successful Edinburgh Festival.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The Fringe is one of the biggest arts showcases in the world (Andrew Milligan\/PA)<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd performing at the Edinburgh Festival costs a fortune, and the single biggest cost is accommodation.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe single biggest barrier to be able to perform, and indeed visit the Edinburgh Festival, is the exorbitant rents that landlords charge.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd year after year it has gone up and up and up, and I think performers and audience members are prepared to pay a bit of a premium for staying in someone\u2019s house that they\u2019ve had to vacate for a month.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut it is growing exponentially year on year on year, and that is meaning that comedy at that level is becoming more elitist.\u201d<\/p>\n
Forde said that the \u201conly people\u201d who can afford to do hours of unpaid work in the hopes that comedy will become a full-time job \u201care privileged people\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd then the only people that can afford to perform at Edinburgh, and indeed visit Edinburgh, are privileged people,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Last year, ex-BBC presenter Gail Porter said she had been \u201cpriced out\u201d of attending the festival in her hometown due to \u201cthe soaring costs of B&Bs\u201d.<\/p>\n
Forde said: \u201cThe Edinburgh model is making it almost impossible to become a working-class successful comedian in this country, and the lack of recognition from Government, I should add, is part of that problem.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Phoebe](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/a09cdd64817006b356dfe374d23adeef.jpeg\"\/)
<\/p>\n
Phoebe Waller-Bridge premiered her play Fleabag at the Fringe (Ian West\/PA)<\/p>\n
Forde also discussed the benefits of Saturday Night Live creator Lorne Michaels bringing a British version of the long-running sketch comedy show to Sky.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m really excited that SNL is coming to the UK. I think it\u2019s a very good thing. I think we need more topical comedy on telly. We need more sketch on telly\u201d, he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou go to the Edinburgh Festival, you see amazing sketch shows, it\u2019s a real breeding ground for talent. It\u2019s a different discipline to individual stand-up, and there should be more of it on telly.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I think SNL in itself isn\u2019t going to dramatically change the culture here.\u201d<\/p>\n
Edinburgh Festival Fringe has helped to launch the careers of numerous comedians and writers.<\/p>\n
Phoebe Waller-Bridge premiered her play Fleabag at the festival and Richard Gadd performed Baby Reindeer there, before it was transformed into a hit Netflix series.<\/p>\n
The Culture, Media and Sport Committee\u2019s evidence session was the first in a series of hearings to be held as part of the State Of Play inquiry, which has invited everyone from those in the UK creative industries that are often overlooked to send in their ideas on what MPs should be examining.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Comedian Matt Forde has said the cost of performing at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe means that comedy is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":60500,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8816],"tags":[748,14059,1102,31356,4884,31357,712,31358,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-60499","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-edinburgh","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-comedy-clubs","10":"tag-edinburgh","11":"tag-edinburgh-festival-fringe","12":"tag-great-britain","13":"tag-matt-forde","14":"tag-scotland","15":"tag-sketch-comedy-show","16":"tag-uk","17":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114421880805565684","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60499","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=60499"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60499\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/60500"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60499"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60499"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60499"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}