FUNNY business is set to welcome festival-goers this summer as the comedy line-up for this year’s Camp Bestival is announced.

The popular, family-orientated festival, which takes place at Lulworth Castle from July 31 to August 3, will also have a circus fancy dress theme and four days of fabulous music and DJ-ing, family fun, arts, crafts, literature, theatre and much more.

Comedian Milton Jones, a regular star with TV comedy show Mock the Week, will be leading a side-splitting line up of clowns.

There will also be funny business throughout the weekend with comedy sets from The Pajama Men, Nat Luurtsema, Ben Norris, Markus Birdman, Colin Hoult, Matt Reed, Jim Smallman, George Egg and Sarah Bennetto.

Camp Bestival ringmaster Rob da Bank said: “The Camp Bestival comedy department have been slaving over a hot keyboard bringing in some of the funniest names on the scene at the moment.

“Personally, I can’t wait to see The Pajama Men but we’re also teasing out some more great musical names – from Pop Will Eat Itself to D:Ream and DJ Yoda – we can’t be accused of not mixing it up in our usual style.

“Something for everyone is our unspoken motto, so I hope you like what you’re seeing so far because there’s more to come.”

Also performing will be Johnny Marr, Sinéad O’Connor, Sophie Ellis Bextor, The Wedding Present, former Beta Band kingpin Steve Mason, Jamaica’s greatest band The Skatalites, bass hero Peter Hook & the Light, mythical funksters, los hermanos Cubanos, The Cuban Brothers and knees-up specialists Chas and Dave.

Another highlight of the festival will be a celebration to mark 50 years since Roald Dahl wrote his best-loved tale Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

There’s also a Bedtime-Story special, with Jo Whiley, Howard Marks and Rob da Bank reading the entire book over the three evenings of the festival.

Milton Jones one-liners

  • Recently I’ve been attending meetings of Eavesdroppers Anonymous – not that they know!’
  • The Grand Old Duke of York – he was a manic depressive. Well, when he was up, he was up…
  • I can’t even count to 10 in French: un, deux, trois, quatre, cinq, six, sept… Aarrgghh! Sorry, I’ve got a huit allergy.’
  • My grandfather is always saying that in the old days people could leave their back doors open. Which is probably why his submarine sank.
  • Militant feminists, I take my hat off to them. They don’t like that.
  • My wife... it’s difficult to say what she does... she sells seashells on the seashore.