Barry Ferns first took a show to the Edinburgh Fringe over 25 years ago, having found his home in the comedy community as a teenager in 1995.
Emotionally, being one of the 3,500 acts to take a show to the the Scottish capital, is draining. Financially, it can be crushing. Barry, who grew up on a council estate in Dorset, experienced this first-hand.
‘When I came to the Fringe, it was really like finding my family, finding home, finding my tribe,’ he explains to Metro.
Barry would go into his overdraft and get a loan in order to make his mark on Europe’s biggest celebration of the arts every August.
Let’s say it costs him £5,000 to take a show north, including accommodation, flyers, venue hire (which Barry thinks is the rough outgoings for many Fringe performers in 2025).
For the other 11 months of the year he would work off £3,000 or so of this debt. He repeated this again and again until 2007 when he went bankrupt having clocked up £45,000 in the red.
Barry, who is at the Fringe this year again, doesn’t know any performer this year who has managed to find accommodation in Edinburgh for less than £1,500, and a venue for less than £2,500, unless they are doing the Free Fringe.
‘I learned about compound interest the working class way,’ Barry says.
To avoid costs, a struggling Barry began cutting corners by giving up his permanent accommodation in order to avoid paying double rent in Edinburgh for a month, and he was eventually left homeless.
‘It took me about three years to get back on my feet,’ Barry says. Thankfully, when he was upright again, Barry decided to find a way to perform on his own terms, and co-founded one of London’s best comedian haunts in Angel Comedy Club.
This is the lengths comedians up and down the country will going to in order to take their shows to the Fringe. But while it’s always been an emotional and financial nightmare for every performer, the playing field used to be much more even.
Over the years Barry has noticed a shift in the festival that he says is not reflected in the Edinburgh Comedy Awards (ECA or ‘the Oscars of comedy’).
This is important because the awards hold a prestigious legacy and have spotted and shaped the British comedy scene since its inception in 1981.
To give you a taste: the ECA launched the careers of Stephen Fry, Steve Coogan, Lee Evans, Al Murray, Sarah Millican, Frank Skinner, Omid Djalili and Eddie Izzard, to name a few.
They mean so much more than their £10,000 reward for best show, and £5,000 best newcomer prize money.
Barry remembers the Fringe before the comedy industry was a money machine.
‘When I started comedy it was still very DIY. It didn’t have too many big agencies [representing comedians]. Then in the mid to late 90s it began to take off,’ he tells Metro.
‘Then there was slowly increasingly more and more money in comedy, which meant producers came in to the Fringe, PR people came in.’
He remembers talking to Eddie Izzard, who won the award – formerly called The Perrier Awards – in 1993. The legendary comedian’s only advice for Barry going up to the Fringe was: ‘Put up posters.’
While everyone is still postering today, this advice shows how much the Fringe has changed. What used to be ramshackled is now a sleek, professional machine.
Nevermind posters, in 2025 having an agent and PR team is the best – and perhaps only – way to get your name out there in any serious way.
Any decent publicist will have chatted up critics and industry names; not to sway reviews – there’s no big conspiracy here – but to get important bums on empty seats, and hopefully create a buzz around their client.
If you don’t have professional backing and are DIYing the Fringe yourself – that means flyering all day, performing into the night, and as Barry has done in previous years, cleaning your venue in the morning for cash – you will likely end up burnt out, out of pocket, and inevitably without that elusive ‘big break’.
‘Everyone used to be on the same ramshackled playing field. Now there are very much two-tiers,’ Barry says. One is shows with help: whether that be financial, agency representation, a team behind them. Another is people who are doing everything themselves, armed with just a dream and either healthy bank accounts or a penchant for risk-taking.
Introducing Barry’s big idea, which he laid out in an open letter to the Edinburgh Comedy Awards and its director Nica Burns this week.
‘There’s such a huge divide that’s come up over the last 30 years between these two types of shows [the DIY and the pro] I think that should be reflected in the awards,’ Barry says.
‘Not every performer has everything, but if you have support it means you’re not having a manifold number of stresses. It means you could focus on the show and the show was going to be better.’
But for everyone else? They’re likely knackered by the time they get on stage for their 7pm show.
‘You can be a bit all over the place. You’ve just done three hours of flyering in the rain, spoken to 100 people that are hopefully coming to your show. So by the time you get on stage, your energy is going to be totally different compared to somebody that isn’t doing all those things and has spent the last four hours before getting on stage working on the show.
‘The work can’t be the same standard, so this should be reflected in the awards.’
Currently the Edinburgh Comedy Awards has two distinguished gongs – best newcomer and best comic/comedy show – and a slightly flimsy third one: the panel prize, also known as the spirit of the fringe award.
‘Like the Fringe itself, there are no rules,’ the website explains of the panel prize. It’s ‘entirely in the gift’ of the panel and may not be awarded at all.
Barry’s solution is to reserve this panel prize for acts who are DIYing the month of August.
‘You can call it the panel prize. Call it the Spirit of Fringe Award. Call it whatever you want – it doesn’t have to be called the DIY Fringe Award. You can keep the same name, but essentially, it’s there. The opportunity is there, so why not make it meaningful, rather than an add on?’ he asks.
Of course there’s a big question: where is the line?
‘Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good,’ Barry says. ‘Even just starting a conversation and bringing language like this makes people aware that these acts exist.
‘Even if it’s an award category for an act that doesn’t have an agent, fine. Okay, they might have a millionaire parent that’s helping. Their dad might be Stewart Lee… But you start drawing what feels like a meaningful line somewhere, and then you can work from there.
‘The first year might not be perfect, but what you’re doing is creating an awareness that there is a gap between those people that have the support of the professional comedy industry, or people that are in that industry, and those that don’t.’
Before Harry Hill’s excellent Fringe debut in 1992 which kickstarted the best newcomer category, the vast majority of debut acts wouldn’t have been part of the national conversation. Now the chatter is dominated by who is the hottest debut act. (I was there last week as a critic, so can attest to this).
Barry’s hope is the same can happen to these ‘DIY’ shows. The Melbourne Comedy Show has done it with The Golden Gibbo Award, singling out independent shows – financially and in spirit – so why can’t the Edinburgh Comedy Awards?
The Edinburgh Comedy Awards’ response to Barry’s open letter
The Edinburgh Comedy Awards told Metro: ‘Writing in response to your open letter, which we read on Chortle. We want to reassure you that whether an act is unrepresented or represented is not a consideration in the Awards judging process.
‘Treating every artist equally is fundamental to the principles of the Awards. Our judging team of panellists and scouts collectively see every single one of the 500+ eligible shows, with over 1,200 viewings so far, and many more still to come.
‘Edinburgh Fringe is open access and offers the opportunity for everyone to come and show what they can do. We are a long way into this year’s legally bound and rigorous judging process, conducted in line with the guidance published on our website.
‘On a personal note, Nica still remembers sitting in an audience of six in a small back room of a pub, seeing the completely unknown Laura Solon deliver the most amazing show – she went on to win Best Comedy Show that year. To everyone who is in a small venue and unrepresented, you have the same chance of winning as everyone else.’
—Nica and the Edinburgh Comedy Awards Producers
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