The Barry Award is an annual prize presented to the most outstanding comedy act at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. It has been awarded since 1998, when it was introduced as the Stella Award, and was renamed in 2000 in honour of Barry Humphries, one of the festival's founding patrons. The Barry is generally regarded as the most prestigious award of the festival, and the winner receives a trophy and cash prize.

Barry Award is the name of several different awards:

The Pajama Men are Shenoah Allen and Mark Chavez, an American comedy duo from Albuquerque, New Mexico. They have won numerous awards including the prestigious Barry Award at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival in 2009 and Best Newcomer and Best of the Fest at The Sydney Comedy Festival in 2009.

Their shows include In Fine Form (as Sabotage), Stop Not Going, Versus vs. Versus, and The Last Stand to Reason. Their latest show In the Middle of No One opened in March 2011.

Allen and Chavez met in high school. They began performing together in 2000, under the name Sabotage, at Tricklock Company's Reptilian Lounge Late Night Cabaret. Their first three original shows premiered at the Tricklock Company Performance Space in Albuquerque, New Mexico. In 2004, they took a show to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, where they were nominated for the Perrier Best Newcomer Award. Since then, they have performed on the Fringe Festival circuit in Canada, and at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival, the Sydney Comedy Festival, the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, and more. In 2010, they had a sold-out run in London, England where they became the highest-selling act ever to play The Soho Theatre.

Sam McMillan (born 2 July 1983) is an Australian musical comedian and writer who performs under the stage name Sammy J. He embraces a variety of media in his comedy, including the use of video and self-composed music. He has released three CD compilations of his comic songs, "The Burden of Popularity", "Sammy J - Live?" and "Sticky Digits", with his latest one "Skinny Man, Modern World" bringing it to 4. He has performed at comedy festivals in Australia and Britain and has appeared on various Australian television shows.

He currently performs with Heath McIvor (aka Randy, a purple puppet) as the duo Sammy J & Randy.

McMillan studied law at the University of Melbourne for two and a half years, where he also directed and appeared in the Melbourne Law Comedy Revue. He says he was more interested in writing jokes than studying, and halfway through the course decided to drop out. He subsequently completed a media degree and began to pursue a full-time comedy career.

He performs under the stage name Sammy J, a condensation of his full name, Samuel Jonathan McMillan. According to McMillan, his stage name originated as a high school nickname which he says he gave to himself "when I was trying to manufacture a bit of popularity... My family and friends were reluctant to adopt it but I pushed and pushed, using it at every opportunity, and eventually started using it on stage."

Denise Margaret Adelaide Scott (born April 24, 1955) is a Melbourne-based stand-up comedian, actor and radio personality.

She has appeared frequently on Australian television since her regular slot on ABC TV's The Big Gig in 1990, and a weekly segment on Tonight Live with Steve Vizard. Scott is one of the most frequent guests on musical quiz show Spicks and Specks, and appeared several times on The Glass House and Good News Week.

She was a member of the Vega 91.5 FM breakfast radio show; Dave and Denise with Shaun Micallef, until she finished up with Vega on 23 November 2007.

Scott frequently makes appearances on Network Ten shows The 7PM Project and Talkin' 'bout Your Generation as well as The Circle.

Scott currently stars as Trish Gross in the Australian drama series Winners and Losers on the Seven Network. She appeared as a guest on the talk show Can of Worms on Network 10 on Monday 29 August.

She is currently residing in Melbourne with her partner John.