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Hal Sparks - Evolution Overdrive

Hal Sparks - Evolution Overdrive

Impressive delivery with theme of humankind’s ongoing evolution

(3 stars)8 Aug 2011

Humankind’s ongoing evolution from apes is the buff American stand-up’s central thesis. En route to his conclusion that only the reintroduction of dinosaurs into the food chain will save us, Sparks blasts the crowd with a string of more commonplace…

John Robertson - Blood & Charm: Disturbing Stories for Disturbing Bedtimes

John Robertson - Blood & Charm: Disturbing Stories for Disturbing Bedtimes

Tightly-scripted surreal monologue full of fascinating true stories

(3 stars)8 Aug 2011

Australian Idol reject Robertson has constructed a tightly-scripted monologue full of fascinating true stories. He wraps his infectiously toothy grin around an autobiographical tale festooned with convoluted gags and dreamlike meanderings. The surreal…

Sex You (I’m Gonna) – featuring Nathan Phillips

Sex You (I’m Gonna) – featuring Nathan Phillips

More sophisticated than it advertises itself to be

(2 stars)8 Aug 2011

Like the ‘grower, not show-er penis’ that Nathan Phillips tells us about, this act sells itself short, proving mercifully more sophisticated than it advertises itself to be; in fact, he’s quite the gentleman. The inescapable problem is that it doesn’t…

Tom Price

Tom Price: Say When

Torchwood actor ebullient, warm and thoroughly engaging

(4 stars)8 Aug 2011

Torchwood actor Price spins a scattershot, shaggy yarn from the schoolyard to Billie Piper. From the off, he’s ebullient and thoroughly engaging, delicately interweaving material about his disabled mum that absolutely drips with warmth while still being…

Bob Downe: 20 Golden Greats

Bob Downe: 20 Golden Greats

Lively hour of high camp, but with only a handful of gags

(2 stars)8 Aug 2011

Celebrating his 20th Fringe anniversary, Aussie polyester sensation Downe presents his usual shtick of fine-voiced covers of popular song, high camp, face-pulling and silly dancing interspersed with DVD giveaways and quiz questions. It’s a lively hour…

Indoor Fox Hunting

Indoor Fox Hunting

Some lovely ideas, but tightening up of content and delivery required

(2 stars)8 Aug 2011

There are some lovely ideas to be found here, with several leaps of the imagination and a nicely absurd viewpoint. But stretched out across 50 minutes, the material wears very thin and a tightening up of both content and delivery is required. You…

Matt Rudge

Matt Rudge

Natural warmth let down by meandering dialogue

(2 stars)8 Aug 2011

While he’s the sort of nice, respectable boy you might take home to meet your mother, Rudge isn’t lighting any fires in this lolloping show, which features meandering dialogue and humour with little spark. The routine seems a bit too earnestly…

Zeus’ Pamphlet

Zeus’ Pamphlet

Enjoyable show combines familiar with the more inventive

(3 stars)8 Aug 2011

This five-piece sketch troupe isn’t bringing anything spectacularly new to the genre but nevertheless it’s an enjoyable show that’s worth seeing. Where some characters are familiar – rude girls on the back of a bus – there are a few ideas that are more…

Fred MacAulay: Legally Bald

Fred MacAulay: Legally Bald

For straightforward traditional stand-up, MacAulay’s your man

(3 stars)8 Aug 2011

With his particularly Scottish brand of stand-up, MacAulay returns for his 23rd festival. By his own admission the majority of the audience was of a certain age but all were charmed by tales of ‘predominantly orange’ airlines, a glance through Scottish…

The Life Doctor

The Life Doctor

Channelling of the most irksome of TV lifestyle gurus disappoints

(2 stars)8 Aug 2011

Written by Adam Lawrence and Phil Wang, Lawrence channels the most irksome of TV lifestyle gurus. The premise quickly falls flat as jokes fail to land or are utterly baffling. A stand-out turn by George Potts and some surprisingly witty pre-recorded…

Des Bishop - My Dad Was Nearly James Bond

Des Bishop - My Dad Was Nearly James Bond

Largely funny, tender and acutely observed ode to late father

(3 stars)8 Aug 2011

An ode to Bishop’s late father, Mike, this should leave the most emotional tough-nut shaken and stirred, as Des tells the story of his dad’s life, from stage actor, Ford model and ‘almost Bond’ to regular ‘Queens, New York’ dad. Walking the line between…

Rayguns Look Real Enough: Balls Deep

Rayguns Look Real Enough: Balls Deep

Thematically-arranged medleys from emphatic performer with laboured set of puns

(2 stars)8 Aug 2011

Glee fans are well catered for in this mash-up of thematically-arranged medleys, but the laughs come thin and slow. Frontman Ray Gun is an emphatic performer, tucking into lead vocals with relish, but his cat costume is a gimmick that long outstays its…

Bring Me the Head of Adam Riches

Bring Me the Head of Adam Riches

Provocative onstage antics not for the faint of heart

(3 stars)8 Aug 2011

Riches returns to the Fringe to perform as leading male in his own unique array of comedy skits. Regularly demanding the onstage assistance of uncomfortable audience members the show is not for the faint of heart as he visibly thrives on a growing air…

Jeff Leach: A Leach On Society

Jeff Leach: A Leach On Society

Energetic gross-out comedy with possibly divisive material

(2 stars)8 Aug 2011

After a promisingly energetic opening, Leach lost momentum due to drunken heckling and had trouble getting the audience onside. His material, dealing mostly with emergent sexuality and humiliating experiences, is divisive and makes for uncomfortable…

Pete Firman: Jiggery Pokery

Pete Firman: Jiggery Pokery

Magic routines with an enjoyable line in potty-mouthed sarcasm

(3 stars)8 Aug 2011

This comic magician takes his tricks seriously. From the opening escape out of a locked box through various sleight-of-hand illusions to the climactic guillotining of an audience member, Firman proves himself to be a very capable conjurer. But he also…

Colm O’Regan: Dislike! A Facebook Guide to Crisis

Colm O’Regan: Dislike! A Facebook Guide to Crisis

Funny and informative social networking guide to Irish history

(4 stars)8 Aug 2011

When it comes to Ireland, what O’Regan does not discuss is not worth knowing. His social networking guide to Irish history and economics embraces themes like sandwich culture, national identity, Mills and Boon, skyscraper sexuality, Rapunzel’s weight…

Stuart Goldsmith

Stuart Goldsmith

A pleasant romp, amusingly delivered, this is easy, assured comedy

(3 stars)8 Aug 2011

Our affable host is one of life’s nice guys: he likes to help. Whether appeasing young godson Tom with some robot dancing or dealing with some of life’s many anxieties, Goldsmith’s (trying to be) your man in a crisis. A pleasant romp, amusingly…

Alistair Green: Outpatient

Alistair Green: Outpatient

Entertaining riffs in illness-themed show not for the squeamish

(2 stars)8 Aug 2011

Outpatient retells Green’s experience of having life-threatening kidney disease diagnosed, and is as hard to stomach as Henoch-Schönlein purpura is to pronounce. Not for the squeamish or hypochondriac, though ‘technically interesting’ with some…

Andi Osho: All the Single Ladies

Andi Osho: All the Single Ladies

Confidently breezing through hour of self-deprecating enjoyable comedy

(3 stars)8 Aug 2011

Although potentially predictable subject matter to those familiar with her persona, Osho is as affable live as she appears on television. Self-deprecating with a sailor’s mouth, she confidently breezes through an hour of female-focussed comedy equally…

Jessica Fostekew: Luxury Tramp

Jessica Fostekew: Luxury Tramp

Observational humour with a confessional edge

(3 stars)8 Aug 2011

Fostekew is a down-to-earth posh bird. Luxury Tramp pertains to the grotty habits which conflict with her plush background, such as eating a kebab washed down with Dom Pérignon. This is observational humour with a confessional edge. Gilded Balloon…

Ahir Shah

Ahir Shah

Stars in his eyes

(3 stars)7 Aug 2011

Ahir Shah is 20, pretty, and used to write for Skins while his posters for Astrology have him doe-eyed and holding a sparkler. These may well be the chief reasons that he’s not quite reaching the audience his set needs. Not to worry, though, as he’s got…

Bridget Christie

Bridget Christie

Slapdash slapstick sloppy stand-up

(3 stars)7 Aug 2011

The wife, mum and stand-up is back at the Fringe with a new show based on her Catholic upbringing. The fact that Bridget Christie is not at all sure doing an hour about religion is a good idea is completely in keeping with her happily shambolic…

Wedding Band: A Comedy by Charlie Baker

Wedding Band: A Comedy by Charlie Baker

Crooner delivers a gentle comic play

(3 stars)7 Aug 2011

What’s the worst thing that could happen to you as the head of a jobbing wedding band? High on the list would be mislaying the PA, having a keyboardist who can’t stop muttering about being fed and, arguably most awkward of all, discovering that you…

Neil by Mouth

Neil by Mouth

Energy and whimsy but far too many groans

(2 stars)7 Aug 2011

In his first and foremost career as a presenter on MTV and covering all manner of extreme sports, Neil Cole may have come across as a funny guy, but here he flatly fails to make the leap into live stand-up. It’s certainly not for a lack of energy: he…

DeAnne Smith

DeAnne Smith

Boys want to be her, girls want to sleep with her

(3 stars)5 Aug 2011

DeAnne Smith is a cutie and she knows how to use it. With a perky demeanour and little-girl voice, Bieber-esque fringe and a wardrobe nicked from Billy Joe Armstrong’s slimmer days, she strides onto the stage and lulls us into a false sense of…

The Real MacGuffins: Skitsophrenic

The Real MacGuffins: Skitsophrenic

Sketch comedy verging on madness

(3 stars)5 Aug 2011

From the preposterous dance that opens this impeccably smooth sketch show, there’s a sense of fun and an appealing silliness to The Real MacGuffins that are hard to resist. They have the knack of being funny without doing much, so in a show as ably…

Kieran and The Joes: Teampowered

Kieran and The Joes: Teampowered

Teambuilding seminar with more laughs than cringes

(3 stars)5 Aug 2011

Taking a cue from Office-style humour, which seeks to entertain with the toe-curlingly cringeworthy, Joe Markham, Joe Parham and Kieran Hodgson’s show takes the form of a teambuilding seminar. From the inspirational music and matching pink ties to pleas…

Vinegar Knickers

Vinegar Knickers

A well-titled ‘sketchy beast’

(2 stars)5 Aug 2011

Sketchy just about sums this show up. Despite high-energy, enthusiastic performances from Samantha Baines, Katie Burnetts and Harriet Fisher, like a cheap chicken Caesar salad the meaty bits are too few and far between, and the ‘lettuce’ material is…

Bane's Joe Bone talks about the noir shows that have stalked the Fringe for three years

Interview - Joe Bone from Bane

The noir shows that have stalked the Edinburgh Fringe for three years

4 Aug 2011

Joe Bone is a busy man. A few years back, he created the hard-boiled character Bruce Bane in the wake of a spate of old detective movies he'd been watching. Fast forward to 2011, and Bane has taken on a life of his own, spawning three stage shows, a…

Fringe Bribes 2011 week one winner: Ashton Kutcher’s Dead Girlfriends by Adam Crow

Fringe Bribes 2011: Week 1 winner - Ashton Kutcher’s Dead Girlfriends by Adam Crow

Also: Paul Vickers, Tom Goodliffe, Fresh Bread and Kevin Shepherd

4 Aug 2011

The List’s drive for bribes got off to an overwhelmingly successful start, weeks before the Fringe even began. The grand winner in our first batch of bribers was Adam Crow and his show, Ashton Kutcher’s Dead Girlfriends, in which the sinister comic…

The Thinking Drinker’s Guide to Alcohol

The Thinking Drinker’s Guide to Alcohol

The duo behind the show raise a glass to the power of alcohol

3 Aug 2011

An incredible amount of elbow-bending occurs in Edinburgh during August. The Fringe is steeped as much in drink as it is in culture. This is no coincidence. The two are inextricably linked. Alcohol, in all its sublime, shape-shifting forms, has inspired…

Fascinating Aïda salute addition of cabaret section to 2011 Fringe

Fascinating Aïda salute addition of cabaret section to 2011 Fringe

Edinburgh Fringe cabaret regulars salute recognition of artform

3 Aug 2011

Good God, there’s a cabaret section! I can’t begin to describe the delight that AT LAST, we misfits have been recognised and awarded a category of our own. Fascinating Aïda have been practising what the legendary New York producer Donald Smith calls…

Comedy and High Art

The Edinburgh Festival comedy shows incorporating High Art

Hannah Gadsby, The Horne Section, New Art Club and Vikki Stone

29 Jul 2011

Sean Lock once likened media coverage of comedians to that of strippers, none too respectful of something that involved divesting so much. Despite comedy’s current boom, scrutiny still tends to focus on comics’ television careers or transgressions…

Interview - Randy, with the help of pal, colleague and sponsor Heath McIvor

Interview - Heath McIvor and Randy

The purple-faced puppet is clean, sober and ready to entertain

29 Jul 2011

What were the circumstances behind your first alcoholic drink? After 32 hours in labour I was exhausted and absolutely furious about being wrenched from my sac of amniotic fluid. Only a scotch would do. Name a famous puppet that could drink you…

Fringe 2011 comedy: sketch shows with an edge

Fringe 2011: Comedy sketches with an edge

Late Night Gimp Fight, Christmas for Two, McNeil and Pamphilon and The Three Englishmen

29 Jul 2011

With the near-veteran likes of the Penny Dreadfuls and Pappy’s opting not to appear in their collective forms this Fringe, it’s a golden opportunity for some of the newer sketch acts to make a mark. But with ever-increasing competition at their level…

Lloyd Langford

Lloyd Langford - True of false?

Some made-up facts about Edinburgh - and one real one

29 Jul 2011

Hello there. My show this year is called The Cold Hard Facts of Life. It’s all about trivia. To that end, I’ve compiled the below list. Every entry, except one, is a complete lie. The question is, can you separate out the lone fact from this manifest of…

Fringe 2011 comedy: five shows about parents

Fringe 2011 comedy: 5 shows about parents

Scott Capurro, Tom Rosenthal, Catie Wilkins and Des Bishop

29 Jul 2011

Scott Capurro. In 2009, the San Francisco comic wrote movingly and warmly about the death of his mother, Donna. Now he’s turned his pain into Who are the Jocks? a show about his ‘best friend and coke dealer’. Pleasance Dome, 556 6550, 6–29 Aug (not…

Jailbird - The Segue Sisters interview

Jailbird - The Segue Sisters interview

Three-part harmony group bring sexy and witty musical comedy to Edinburgh

29 Jul 2011

‘It was a moment of drunken inspiration, which we spend every second of our lives regretting.’ Via email, three-part harmony group The Segue Sisters collectively explain how their charming, sexy and witty brand of musical comedy came about.’We actually…

Fringe 2011 comedy: five musical comedians

Fringe 2011 comedy: 5 musical comedians

Isy Suttie, Steve Pretty, ATF?, Pistol & Jack and Gareth Richards

29 Jul 2011

Isy Suttie. Dobby (from Peep Show not Harry Potter, silly) brings us Pearl and Dave, another heartwarming multi-character tale. With his Perfect Mixtape, Pretty recalls the tunes played at his own wake in 2005 (there’s a story there) and wonders what…

Fringe 2011 comedy: five free shows

Fringe 2011 comedy: five free shows

Featuring Hatty Ashdown, Jody Kamali, Paul Foot, Norman Lovett and Gadd, Kirk and Winning

29 Jul 2011

Hatty Ashdown ‘Hatty Ashdown’s brain is made up of funny molecules,’ claims Friday Night Dinner creator Robert Popper with what is presumably deemed as a compliment.

Interview - Ruby Wax

Losing It - Ruby Wax interview

Wax brings her 'mental health comedy’ to Edinburgh

26 Jul 2011

Seasoned festival-goers may remember Ruby Wax’s brief two-day stint with Losing It, her ‘mental health comedy’, back in 2008. Since then, this partly autobiographical opus has grown wings, and been showcased in hospitals and lecture halls across the UK.

Interview - Josh Howie

I am a Dick - Josh Howie interview

The comedian tells us, in his own words, why he's a dick

26 Jul 2011

I am a dick. This was something I had to finally embrace. When I talked to comic friends of mine, where I’m just being me and letting my guard down, I got sick of them saying, ‘stop with the jokey-jokes, the thing that is funny about you is that you’re…

Interview - Nick Helm

Dare to Dream - Nick Helm interview

The on-stage angry man is actually quite pleasant

26 Jul 2011

It may surprise anyone who witnessed Nick Helm’s breakthrough Fringe last year that he is actually something of a festival veteran. Back in 1997, he made his Edinburgh debut with the first of three annual school plays while in 2001 he came up with a…

Andrew Maxwell

Andrew Maxwell - The Lights Are On

The King of Comedy returns to his ancestral pile

26 Jul 2011

To Andrew Maxwell, there are few sounds better than a roomful of people laughing. All the better if they’re laughing at something the tiny Dubliner with the massive talent has just said. ‘Laughter speeds shit up,’ insists the man crowned King of Comedy…

Interview - Keith Farnan

Money, Money, Money - Keith Farnan interview

The conscience-fuelled Irish comic talks money

26 Jul 2011

While there are few people who are able to laugh at themselves quite like the Irish, recent times have been somewhat trying for Celtic self-mockery. The aftershock of the global financial crisis is still hurting the Emerald Isle and Keith Farnan sees…

Josie Long

Josie Long - The Future is Another Place

Little miss sunshine gets political

26 Jul 2011

JosieWorld is a place built on home-spun whimsy and Ms Long presides over it with a refreshing optimism, pointing out all the little things that make us smile or inspire or deserve kudos. In her fourth Fringe show it is being impinged upon by a newfound…

Interview - Michael Winslow

Police Academy's human sound effect set for Edinburgh - Michael Winslow interview

2011 Fringe debut from actor best-known for iconic 80s comedies

26 Jul 2011

It’s been 27 years since the first film, yet Michael Winslow is still roundly known as ‘that guy who made the noises in Police Academy.’ Though Police Academy 8 is mooted for next year, he’s unperturbed by the enduring connection to the movie series.

Interview - The Noise Next Door

Their Finest Hour - The Noise Next Door interview

Lean and hungry improv machine 2011 Edinburgh Fringe

26 Jul 2011

‘Edinburgh audiences push you a bit more and they challenge you because they’re generally more intelligent.’ Sam Pacelli, one-fifth of improv troupe The Noise Next Door, clearly hasn’t performed at one of the Fringe’s more salacious late-night venues.

Interview - Shazia Mirza

Busybody - Shazia Mirza interview

The comedian discusses being both a busybody and the go-to girl for Islam

26 Jul 2011

As a female Muslim stand-up, Shazia Mirza would often find herself asked to comment on current affairs. Around 9/11 she was quoted left, right and centre but soon tired of being the go-to girl for Islam. ‘I always get people ringing up asking my opinion…

Interview - Elis James

Elis James - Do You Remember The First Time?

Starstruck Welsh comedian divulges secrets

26 Jul 2011

Beguiling storyteller Elis James returns to the Fringe this year with a show about his earliest experiences, borrowing its title from the iconic Pulp song for Do You Remember the First Time? ‘The first time I did a few of the formative things everyone…

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