Sketch is the basic unit of comedy on the internet now, and the fact that you don’t need to know the comic’s persona or back catalogue – or, indeed, anything beyond the few words in the caption setting the scene up – mean that an act you’ve never heard of before can make a dent in your Insta feed or For You page with an ease that a two-minute stand-up clip might not. That goes for TV sketches too. It’s a rare day on the internet when Tim Robinson’s hot dog guy from the peerless I Think You Should Leave – the one who insists we’re all trying to find the guy who did this – doesn’t make an appearance.
And the exact thing which made sketch less tenable on TV is one of its strengths online. Cheap, deliberately half-arsed props and costumes are funny. One of Munya Chawawa’s first big hits was an impression of Nigella Lawson where a T-shirt flipped backwards over his head made for a decent approximation of her hair. Kae Kurd made a very passable nasal cannula out of some old iPhone headphones for a sketch where he recovered from a bank holiday bender in hospital. Ed Jones does a lounge singer impression using what is very clearly a TV remote as a prop microphone.
That lo-fi look and feel – the sense that you’ve just stumbled on a random member of the public who had a funny idea and decided to do it – has helped bring sketch comedy to a brand new audience who want little nibbles of comedy which looks and sounds like they do.
Five young sketch comedians to watch
1. Durk and Ski
Two workmates who started doing funny videos for a laugh in their spare time have built up such a following that they’ve even done some live shows. Their best stuff riffs on the mundane becoming increasingly strange, and their long-running parody of Coronation Street – which even had its own Christmas special episodes – is both very funny and genuinely gripping.
2. Freya Mallard
Mallard is a stand-up most of the time, but is a good example of a comic who’s managed to build up a following by combining live work with deeply relatable sketches in Instagram and TikTok. See the one with her mum who can’t remember the melody to any song, or her collab with fellow comedian Abi Clarke pulling apart how Gen Z are written for TV.
3. Kae Kurd
Also predominantly a stand-up and podcast host, Kurd’s ear for an impression is absolutely impeccable and showcased best in his short skits – especially when he’s picking out the different cadences of radio presenters.