"I haven't got time," gasps the producer of Sheffield's Grin Up North comedy festival which kicks off tonight with leftie comic Mark Steel at the Memorial Hall.

"There's no chance of me meeting and greeting Jimmy Carr in his dressing room at the City Hall" – he's on there this Saturday and Sunday – "and then going out and slagging off Barnsley," he says.

Organised with events supremo Scott Barton, the festival's marketing director, this is Grin's fourth year and the biggest and best yet.

Apart from Steel and Carr, other big names include Dylan Moran ("the Oscar Wilde of comedy"), Frankie Boyle from TV's Mock the Week, Jeremy Hardy (Radio 4's News Quiz), the Comedy Store Players and a host of others.

"It's as big as it can get in its current form. It's just me and Scott and a couple of laptops," says Toby, who juggles being morning presenter for Radio Sheffield and running the Last Laugh comedy club, along with TV and film work.

"We need to invest. It takes up a lot of time and financial risk but it's worth it."

He's already had it suggested that they take the festival up to Leeds to expand but he won't hear of it. "It's Sheffield comedy festival."

But he is insistent that Grin Up North can't stay as it is.

"I think a festival should be putting on stuff that doesn't have to make money. I'd like it to be a bit more left field, a bit more experimental," he says.

There is also the possibility of incorporating a children's festival and street theatre. Scott came a cropper last year with his rained-on Streetlife festival, which was not repeated this year.

Grin Up North doesn't make either of them loadsa money. "It's fantastic when I can get people I know in the business to come to Sheffield," says Toby.

While most of the audience is local, people do take breaks in the city to coincide with the festival which is advertised on London's Tube.

"I know the hotels do well out of us," adds Toby.

For the first year, the festival is running its own comedy festival featuring the 10 best fledgling acts which have done well during open mic nights at the Last Laugh.

They will battle it out at the First laugh in the Memoral Hall on Saturday, October 18, with profits in aid of Sheffield Children's Hospital.

"They're taking their first steps on a big stage. We might find the next Peter Kay among them. In fact, I think we have," says Toby.

Full details on www.sheffieldcomedyfestival .com or see brochures at libraries, City Hall and Lyceum.



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