Quite out of all proportion to their reliability or utility, the Perrier comedy awards have always incited a mesmerising fascination as the honour everyone loves to hate.

Most entertainment gongs set the seal on an artist’s growing reputation and ratchet up their reputation. The Perrier crowns artists few had ever heard of and probably will never see again. For the past 25 years the ritual has played itself out at the tail of the fringe: the announcement of the winner, the congratulation, the mutterings of “Who?” At last, though, after years of increasingly bitter criticism, the awards are set to evolve.

For the prize organisers, innovation reflects the fact that fringe comedy has changed beyond recognition since 1981, when only 40 shows were in the running. These days there are 200 competing for the award. To help bring it up to date, the British comedy world has received from the organisers a detailed questionnaire designed to survey the ways in which it could improve.

For many, change can’t come soon enough. The Perrier has long been a target for sustained nit- picking, to a degree that confirms the suspicion that comedians can outdo actors in bitchy queeniness any day.

However, in the past five years the attacks have been stinging. There have been cries of sexism — the only female winners have been Emma Thompson, as part of the 1981 Cambridge Footlights revue, Jenny Eclair and Laura Solon last year. Some campaigning performers — Thompson again and Mark Thomas — have poured scorn on Perrier’s connection with Nestlé.

Other arguments have broken out over eligibility — acts deemed too famous by virtue of significant exposure on television are not considered. And in recent years the triumph of quasi-theatrical performers, such as Solon and Will Adamsdale, has been in stark contrast to previous stand-up and sketch-based winners.

“Clearly the Perrier is flagging,” believes Tommy Sheppard, the founder of the Stand comedy clubs in Edinburgh and Glasgow, and a longtime critic.

“A bit of tinkering might resuscitate it briefly, but ultimately too many comics are getting fed up with the influence the Perriers have, with the way it sets the agenda of who’s approved and who isn’t. A lot of comics agree it’s time to screw the cap back on and put the bottle on the shelf.

“As well as being a naked marketing exercise, the idea of any comedy competition is inherently flawed. Comedy is too subjective a beast to be judged in that way. One man’s humour is another man’s tragedy.”

Nica Burns, the director of the Perrier, shrugs off criticism. “It’s like a wedding anniversary for us,” she says. “You couldn’t survive 25 years without a bit of housekeeping and now it’s time for that. The awards were a baby, then a toddler and now we’re looking to take them into adulthood.”

Changes to the prize, which are due to be announced in London on Wednesday, could include the creation of a separate award for foreign comedians, an award solely for stand-up comedy, another for other types of shows and an award recognising older, more experienced comics.

The former Bullseye host Jim Bowen made his debut on the fringe last year in a sold-out, one-man show and looks forward to benefiting if the senior comic award is instituted.

“Before I heard that I would have said it was time to rebuild the Perrier, but it’s different if it can fit a guy like me in,” he jokes. “When I was in Edinburgh, the Perrier seemed to me like the Turner prize for comedy. Half the acts were as funny as an unmade bed.”

Burns says it is too early to know where the responses to her questionnaire will lead. But the acknowledgment that it’s time for a rejig is bound to please many in the world of stand-up comedy.

“One of the most consistent requests,” she says, “has been for an official quiet room to be set aside at the ceremony. You might think it’d be a place to bitch. I prefer to think of it as passionate and open debate.”

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