Patrick

Just had an unfortunate doomscroll of @LeeHurstComic's timeline. A man whose career peaked sitting next to Gary Lineker on *They Think It's All Over*. Even then, people mainly remembered the bloke on the other team. He opened his own comedy club, the Backyard, which was smart, because it was the only way he could guarantee a booking. He's the only comedian whose biggest audience is the people blocking him on X. His tweets get more replies than his gigs ever got laughs, and most of the replies are corrections. Lee calls himself a free thinker, which is true, because nobody would pay for those thoughts. He's spent so long complaining that comedy has gone woke, you'd think something had stopped him being funny. Mate, that was the '90s, and you managed it all on your own. He's built a whole second career out of being angry online. That's impressive for a man who's never once made his point in under 280 characters. He's the only comic on the circuit whose material ages worse than his photos. And to be fair, he does have a legacy. Every young comedian who walks past his club learns the most important lesson in the business: get famous on a panel show, then quit before anyone notices you've stopped telling jokes.