Carr 'took joke row to heart'

Jimmy says lots of people are victims of jokes in his show

Jimmy Carr has spoken out about the criticism he received recently over his joke about injured troops, saying he "really took it to heart".

The comedian, who's known for his near-the-mark sense of humour, caused a row in the press after complaints about the joke at a Manchester gig.

He told Newsbeat: "I really took it to heart. I spend a lot of time reading the papers and writing jokes about things that are in the papers and you sort of think it's all fun in the tabloids.

"I'm a huge supporter of our troops and it felt terrible."

He went on to explain that 9,000 people had seen the gig live but that only two had complained at the time.

'Very edgy'

He added: "When people come to see me live, they know what kind of jokes I do. They know I'm going to be very, very edgy and I'm going to be saying things that are perceived as unsayable on television or radio.

"Suddenly radio stations and newspapers were phoning up people that weren't at the gig, who had lost family members in a war and telling them the joke and I just felt horrible, as you would.

"Within the run of the show and on stage, there are worse jokes than that in the show.

"Lots of people are the victims of jokes, that's the way they work in my show. I think it was taken out of context."

He says he thinks the troops do an "incredible" job and has visited rehabilitation centres at Selly Oak and Headley Court to see the work that goes on there.

He claims that the response hasn't all been negative and was grateful for social networking sites like Twitter for allowing fans to provide direct feedback.

"I've had a huge amount of support from guys in the armed forces," he said.

"There's things like Twitter now where it feels like if you get a hard time from the papers there is a direct line.

"That was really heartening because a lot of guys that I've met in the armed forces find that sort of thing very funny, it's a very dark sense of humour."

Jimmy Carr's Rapier Wit tour has been booked up until next August and the comedian says he's working roughly 200 nights out of the year.