Comedian Ben Elton has announced that he will be hitting the road for his first UK tour in five years next autumn.

The BAFTA Award winner will be heading out on his new 54-date tour, Authentic Stupidity, in 2024 - including four dates in Kent.

The writer, best known for penning sitcoms Blackadder and the Young Ones, will make his first visit to the county with a night at the Marlowe Theatre in Canterbury on Sunday, October 6.

The tour will then continue with shows at Folkestone’s Leas Cliff Hall on Saturday, October 12, the Assembly Hall Theatre in Tunbridge Wells on Tuesday, October 15 and Chatham’s Central Theatre on Friday, November 15.

Tickets go on sale at midday today (December 15) and can be booked online via the venue websites or Ticketmaster.

“We need signs to tell us to step off escalators, we elect gibbering fools to lead us and now we’ve invented artificial intelligence which is actually going to replace us,” says the 64-year-old. “I’ve spent 45 years in comedy exploring the outer limits of human idiocy and my mission has never been more timely.”

The comedian is also known for writing the original script to award-winning musical We Will Rock You, based on the music of Queen, and starred as the Rebel Leader in the show when it returned to the London Coliseum earlier this year.

A recording of Ben Elton Live, the stand-up’s 2019 UK tour, will be broadcast on Channel 4 at 11.05pm tonight.