Poker Pro Wins 2017 Fringe Award for Funniest Joke

Each year in August, the Edinburgh Festival Fringe holds the world’s largest arts festival, covering a range of programmes, including theatre, dance, music, exhibitions and comedy. No Fringe is complete, however, without its award for the funniest one-liner joke,’ which this year was won by the Ken Chen, a Cambridge University educated professional poker player.
Ken Chen had his joke shortlisted as one of 15 one-liners provided by some of Britain’s top comedians, and needless to say he was up against some pretty stiff competition, with the Scottish comedian Frankie Boyle’s entry being “Trump’s nothing like Hitler. There’s no way he could write a book,” while Alexei Sayle’s offering was “I’ve given up asking rhetorical questions. What’s the point?”
Triumphing over his competitors in the mirth stakes, however, was Ken Chen, who made the following amusing joke about the recently redesigned currency in the country: “I’m not a fan of the new pound coin, but then again, I hate all change.”
If you would like to check out all the entries that made the top 15 funniest jokes, you can do so here. In the meantime, my own personal pick of the bunch would have been this amusing line from Irish comedian Ed Byrne:
“I have two boys, five and six. We’re no good at naming things in our house.”
After receiving the reward, Ken Chen now joins a string of past winners which includes the likes of Tim Vine, Rob Auton, Stewart Francis, Masai Graham, Nick Helm, and Zoe Lyons. Ken Chen had been studying mathematics at Cambridge University before leaving to become a poker pro, whilst also continuing to pursue his love of comedy, and performing stand-up. Commenting upon the similarities between poker and comedy, Cheng said:
“The first similarity is how both are based around a constant barrage of either extreme punishment or reward. In poker, it’s money; in comedy, it’s laughs. Every day you sit down at the poker table you could win or lose hundreds and, by the same notion, every time you step on stage you could kill or bomb.”