As comedy impresario Jami Gong sees it, diversity is a sign that Chinese-language improv is starting to take off. For the first time since he began organising an international comedy festival three years ago, the Chinese section drew contestants from outside Hong Kong - four mainlanders and an American, in addition to five Hongkongers.
'From the day I started my club, the game plan was to have a local comedy scene of not just English, but Chinese improv. And it's working,' says Gong, owner of the TakeOut Comedy club in Central. 'We've been making progress. I knew that if I offered the platform, there would be performers, because laughter is the best medicine.'
Chinese-language stand-up isn't a novel concept in Hong Kong: local funnymen such as Dayo Wong Chi-wah have been entertaining fans for years with their brand of humour. But although their performances are called dung duk siu - an almost literal Cantonese translation of stand-up comedy, they're typically held in concert halls and stadiums. The experience is very different from the intimate shows that form the backbone of stand-up circuits in the West.
Aspiring comedian Matina Leung Wai-man says: 'What we do is quite different. We're unknowns, while someone like Jan Lamb Hoi-fung was famous [as a DJ and radio host] before getting into stand-up. What they do is more like a humorous lecture, there is no interaction with the crowd.'
Leung, who came second in the Chinese and English-language sections at this year's festival, is among several comedians who learned the craft at TakeOut's free weekly classes.
The free classes have been a priority from the beginning, because stand-up comedy is new to many people in Hong Kong, Gong says.