Just for Laughs
annual comedy festival held in Montreal, Quebec Province, Canada
Just for Laughs (French: Juste pour rire) is a comedy festival that is held every July in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Founded in 1982 by Gilbert Rozon, it is the largest international comedy festival in the world. In addition to the festivals themselves, Just for Laughs also developed, produced, and distributed other forms of comedy entertainment, such as television programming.
In March 2024, it was announced that Just for Laughs as a business went bankrupt, and consequently, all of its festivals were cancelled. The media speculated about its future in Montreal, and how it could be uncertain. In May, however, ComediHa, another Quebec-based company specializing in comedy, announced its acquisition of several assets, including the festival. It was then announced that the anglophone festival would go on, albeit smaller, and without the usual televised galas.
History
Just for Laughs was formed in 1982 as a two-day French-language event. In 1985, Andy Nulman joined the festival's staff and introduced English-language events as well; under Nulman's stewardship, the festival increased to a full month, with French-speaking performers during the first half, and English speakers in the second half. International and non-verbal acts (acrobats, pantomimes, etc.) are scattered throughout the program.
“Just for Laughs” enters the record as annual comedy festival held in Montreal, Quebec Province, Canada. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Just, Laughs and annual can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Maps, plans, fabric surveys and administrative records can establish how the site’s name, extent and function changed over time. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 17, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1362509. Authority coordinates are 45.510, -73.564. 1 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1982, 2024 and 1985.
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This entry incorporates text from “Just for Laughs” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.