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Comedy and Reviews

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Josh Widdicombe: If This Show Saves One Life

Josh Widdicombe: If This Show Saves One Life

Steering away from the dangers of blanding out

(3 stars)14 Aug 2011

After an impressive opening flurry of gags about trees, scissors and burglars, Josh Widdicombe is suddenly bumped off his stride. Not by hecklers per se, but by the woman on his front row who has, shall we say, a bit of a thing for him. Once the awkward…

Joe Fairbrother: Characters

Joe Fairbrother: Characters

Gentle audience-teasing character comedy

(3 stars)14 Aug 2011

Whoever was doing the flyering for this show should be awarded some kind of Edinburgh Flyering Award. They absolutely nailed the target audience for the opening salvo of Joe Fairbrother’s fiendishly subtle character show. Welcomed in by a posh…

The W. Kamau Bell Curve – Ending Racism In About An Hour

The W. Kamau Bell Curve – Ending Racism In About An Hour

Race-related comedy that avoids cliché

(3 stars)14 Aug 2011

Ending racism in ‘about an hour’ might seem like a bit of a challenge to set yourself. Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela were at it for a lot longer and they still didn’t eradicate the hate, but W Kamau Bell’s Fringe show is still a…

Hitch and Mitch – Genisis

Hitch and Mitch – Genisis

Shambolic sketch comedy about comedy

(2 stars)14 Aug 2011

First off, an apology – Richard Hanrahan and Adam Mitchell specifically beseeched reviewers not to include the word ‘shambolic’ in their write-ups of the show. Which is all well and good, fellas, but when you go out of your way to incorporate…

Chris Coxen’s Space Clone Audition

Chris Coxen’s Space Clone Audition

Accomplished character-based comedy show

(3 stars)14 Aug 2011

Framing his sketch show as a competition in which the audience decides which of Coxen’s four characters will be cloned to populate outer space seems unnecessary. This US comic’s creations - sleazy lounge lizard, deluded motivational speaker, shy weather…

Andrew O’Neill

Andrew O’Neill

Alt comedian is slightly amusing but fails to deliver big laughs

(2 stars)14 Aug 2011

The alternative comedian ticks many boxes - vegan, transvestite, metalhead - but unfortunately doesn’t generate enough big laughs to check off ‘funny’. Random bursts of surrealism rely on their suddenness rather than content for humour, and while his…

Casual Violence

Casual Violence

Versatile cast perform cherfully absurd sketches

(3 stars)14 Aug 2011

‘Six bastards meet their death’ in this cheerfully absurd sketch show. Lively and loud, it’s an excellent instance of what wonders can be achieved with a lilo, George Michael and a depressive, vodka-swilling clown. Though the result is not quite the…

Chris Martin

Chris Martin

Run of the mill show from the man who definitely isn't in Coldplay

(2 stars)14 Aug 2011

Martin certainly has swagger, but his comedy feels not so much natural but ‘learned’ (with honours from the Whitehall/McIntyre College of Advanced Observational Stand-Up). The initial promise of a show about being alone in a hectic world is ditched for…

Chris McCausland

Chris McCausland

Disappointingly unoriginal set from the London comic

(2 stars)14 Aug 2011

McCausland’s London-centric material never rises above the mundane in a slow hour where jokes occasionally waft by. There’s some Neolithic stuff about budget airlines and how he’s joined a gym mixed in with the odd well-crafted gem. He’s capable of much…

Aidan Bishop

Aidan Bishop

The New York-based Irishman takes sweet revenge on his childhood torments

(3 stars)14 Aug 2011

After being dismissed as unintelligent and lazy his entire childhood, New Yorker Bishop is clearly still harbouring a great deal of resentment towards those who contributed to his misery as a dyslexic youth in the 80s. Bishop combines a bitter attitude…

Conor O’Toole

Conor O’Toole

Good material let down by awkward delivery

(2 stars)14 Aug 2011

Young Irishman O’Toole turns teacher as he gives us a lesson in typography. The performance contains a good level of material especially during brief moments of audience interaction. The show is severely hindered however by his shy and nervous delivery…

Armageddapocalypse

Armageddapocalypse

Loving pastiche of action movies from Footlights crew

(3 stars)14 Aug 2011

One for action movie fans, this Cambridge-based theatre group gleefully ransacks the genre, and all its drug-dealing, wire-wearing, daughter-kidnapping clichés. Written by Footlights veterans, the hammy nonsense is enhanced with parkour shadow puppets…

Chris Cox

Chris Cox

Odd-looking comic successfully combines magic and comedy

(3 stars)14 Aug 2011

Finding the middle ground between a traditional magician and stand-up, Cox wins over even the most reluctant of audience participants with an engaging, geeky charm. Extra bonus points for highlighting his resemblance to the love child of Sue Perkins and…

Wittank

WitTank

A dazzling display of sketch genius

(5 stars)12 Aug 2011

A sketch show to make even the most po-faced Fringe-watcher break out in hives of hysteria, WitTank takes comedy to brilliantly berserk new levels. An unlikely kleptomaniac, a sinister headmaster, a sugar freak and an unhappily-housed grandfather are…

Mark Thomas: Extreme Rambling (Walking the Wall)

Mark Thomas: Extreme Rambling (Walking the Wall)

Following a dangerous tourist trail

(4 stars)12 Aug 2011

The problem with political comedy is that, in sharing a joke with a person simultaneously making a serious point, you can easily become confused about what it is you’re signing up for. Added to this, Mark Thomas has an enviable rhetorical tool at his…

Lee Camp Is: Yet Another American Mistake

Lee Camp Is: Yet Another American Mistake

Rabble-rousing American gets mad at current affairs

(4 stars)12 Aug 2011

Lee Camp aims his freewheeling cannon at all the aspects of American (and Western) culture that are easy to criticise: childhood obesity, people who believe in aliens, sweatshops, war as big business, the moon landings, the death penalty, multinational…

Andrew Maxwell

Andrew Maxwell

Blistering set from the mercurial Dubliner

(4 stars)12 Aug 2011

Anyone who goes to see a barrel-load of comedy this August will no doubt witness stand-up after stand-up making a fleeting reference to the summer riots, if only to prove they have a handle on what’s going on in outside the Edinburgh bubble. Not Andrew…

Jen Brister is British(ish)

Jen Brister is British(ish)

Wonderfully madcap look at identity

(4 stars)12 Aug 2011

Jen Brister has got it all going on in this splendid hourful of laughing till your face hurts. As a half-Spanish, ‘sepia’-tinged lesbian from London, the question ‘yeah, but where do you come from originally?’ led her to consider what it means to be…

Nick Helm - Dare to Dream

Nick Helm - Dare to Dream

Shouty Marmite musical act

(3 stars)12 Aug 2011

Nick Helm is whipping up quite a storm on the comedy circuit, and you can see why. He is certainly a force to be reckoned with: confident, commanding, and able to straddle the line between brusque, brash delivery, and engaging moments of…

Late Night Gimp Fight!

Late Night Gimp Fight!

Fast-paced sketches are more smutty than obscene

(3 stars)12 Aug 2011

Turn up to a show like this at such a late hour and you should know what you’re letting yourself in for. Despite the establishment whiff that hangs around an Edinburgh Comedy Award nomination, if you can’t stomach jokes about bumming, incest and the Ku…

Gavin Webster: All Young People Are C**ts

Gavin Webster: All Young People Are C**ts

Likeably profane and bitter hour

(3 stars)12 Aug 2011

Accoding to Geordie comic Gavin Webster, ‘all young people are cunts’. He believes that so much that he’s been driven to name this year’s Fringe show with the phrase, concluding his amiable hour with a profanity-fuelled sing-along. Admitting to being…

Christmas for Two: Friends With You

Christmas for Two: Friends With You

Variable sketch show of audacious surrealism

(3 stars)12 Aug 2011

This sketch duo’s Friends with You starts with a rape joke. The way they treat the topic that has become a shibboleth of contemporary comedy is a statement of purpose, signalling their intent to sidle up against the profane, nudge things into the…

Daniel Sloss - The Joker

Daniel Sloss - The Joker

Ridiculously talented young comedy buck

(4 stars)12 Aug 2011

Daniel Sloss – a charming, elongated Macaulay Culkin doppelganger, and protégé of Frankie Boyle – begins by listing the reasons why people might not like his show. ‘I smile, I swear, I’m happy and I can jump. The ones who won’t like me, they’re the old…

Benny Boot: Set-Up, Punchline… Pause for Laughter

Benny Boot: Set-Up, Punchline… Pause for Laughter

The secrets of comedy remain a mystery here

(2 stars)12 Aug 2011

When you set yourself up as a stand-up who has nailed the very fundamentals of comedy structure, you really are setting yourself up for one mighty fall. And Benny Boot plummets without trace during this show. The crowd is welcomed in by his South…

Keith Farnan: Money, Money, Money

Keith Farnan: Money, Money, Money

Well-informed monologue about money

(3 stars)12 Aug 2011

Irish stand-up Keith Farnan has a lively stage presence and off-the-cuff style, with a congenial, raggedy appearance that is equal parts Bee Gee and Celtic Jesus. Such up-beat charisma serves Farnan well for his wandering, socially-conscious…

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