HAVE you heard the one about the stupid comedian? No? Well, you’re not likely to. A Mensa test organised by The Times suggests that intelligence is a prerequisite for a career as a stand-up comic.

We asked 12 comedians at the Edinburgh Fringe — including Stewart Lee, who co-wrote Jerry Springer — the Opera — to sit a formal test and found that they were overwhelmingly smarter than average.

Four were automatically invited to join Mensa and three were told that they were borderline candidates who would probably gain membership after a second test. Half of the comedians were in the top 3 per cent of brainboxes in Britain and one, Natalie Haynes, was in the top 1 per cent.

On the most common scale for measuring IQ, a score of 130 or more puts a candidate in the top 2 per cent in the country. Haynes, whose show Run or Die involves a rapidly spoken monologue about an urban dystopia and parrots’ IQ, came top of the 12 with a score of 134.

She believes that high intelligence is important for the Fringe, where cerebral comedy is rewarded, but it can be a hindrance on the club circuit. “It would be difficult to do a show without coming from a clever base point,” she said, “but when I started out people would say ‘You’re too clever’.

“One of the only places you can be clever and funny is Edinburgh. It’s not true that I’m too clever to play a club, but I’ve been told so often, I’ve given up trying to argue against it.”

Cerebral comedians often hide their intelligence behind a comedy persona, she said. Al Murray, who graduated from Cambridge University with one of the highest marks in his subject, has become a highprofile comedian with his character of the pub landlord. “It is less threatening,” Haynes said. “People are more likely to like Al Murray, pub landlord, than Alastair Murray, history graduate.”

Rob Deering, who scored 130, said that stand-up attracts geeks. “There is a train spotterish aspect of stand-up. There are so many people on the circuit who collect stamps or beer mats or whatever. I like to think I’m a rock star but I am a bit nerdy when it comes to film knowledge.”

It is unusual to find someone who does not display quick wit on the circuit, he said. “You expect a certain level of speed and wit. Every now and then you meet a comedian who isn’t keeping up with the dressing-room banter and you think: ‘Ooh, that’s unusual’.”

Caroline Garbatt, a spokeswoman for Mensa, said that writing comedy could be a way of sharpening the mind. “Comedians are exercising their brains on a daily basis,” she said. “They are not doing mundane, repetitive activities. The way they look at the world and find ways to make everything amusing requires intelligence. You only have to look at David Baddiel and the That Was the Week That Was team to see that comedy is full of intelligent people.”

Colin Cooper, senior lecturer in psychology at Queen’s University Belfast and a consultant for the BBC’s Test the Nation, said that verbal reasoning was a very good indicator of intelligence.

“One thing you do need to be a comedian is to be able to think on your feet,” he said.

Stewart Lee, who was keen to retake the test to become a Mensa member, said that IQ questions tested only one aspect of comedy. “Another fantastic kind of comedy is farting and falling over,” he said. “There is no part of the Mensa test that determines when would be a good time to fart.”

SMART LINES

Natalie Haynes
On Ingvar Kamprad, the founder of Ikea, overtaking Bill Gates as the richest man on Earth because of the weakness of the dollar. “That is by accident rather than by design, then, which is ironic.”

Stewart Lee
On how the IRA, with their bomb warnings, now seem quaint compared with suicide bombers. “Proper British terrorists. They didn’t want to be British, but they were.”

Rob Deering
“I got the Next catalogue this morning — I haven’t even read the last one.”

Izzy Suttie
“What does a jazz singer catch from his guitar? Hepatitis A,B,C,D,E.”

Mark Olver
“There are two drugs that ought to be legalised: heroin and Viagra. Just to give smackheads one last vein to aim for.”

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