Brian Donaldson
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The Alternative Comedy Experience 2013 UK tour
11 Jun 2013
Stewart Lee brings his merry band of acts back for more
It feels like the festival, looks like the festival and it might even smell like the festival. And yet The Alternative Comedy Experience is done and dusted before the middle of July and off to the cutting room for the bods at Comedy Central to shape…
Five Things You Didn't Know about David O’Doherty
11 Jun 2013
The Dubliner recorded a song called 'Orange', co-wrote a book about pandas and wanted to play jazz
1 O’Doherty’s original ambition was to follow his father into the world of jazz music but he realised quite quickly (with his dad’s critical words ringing in his ears: ‘you can’t polish a turd’) that it wasn’t really for him. He does credit his old…
Little Howard and the Magic Pencil of Life and Death
11 Jun 2013
Howard Read and his naughty animated alter ego, Little Howard, to perform in Scotland
You can get away with quite a lot when you’re a comedian hiding behind a character. During his appearance at the 2007 Royal Variety Performance, Howard Read was able to be rather naughty in the guise of someone else: his live animated six-year-old alter…
Lucy Beaumont on Radio 4 with To Hull and Back
11 Jun 2013
BBC Radio New Comedy Award winner to invade the waves for a late-night one-off
How wonderfully convenient that this half-hour comedy should kick off with a line from the Housemartins’ ‘Caravan of Love’: ‘Every woman, every man / Join the caravan of love / Stand up, stand up, stand up.’ For fellow Hull-born entertainer Lucy…
Hardeep Singh Kohli mixes food, chat and comedy for 'delicious' show Indian Takeaway
10 Jun 2013
'I’ve invented a couple of dishes... Hopefully it’s more fusion than confusion.’
With interest in cuisine never being higher as witnessed by the rise in the number of food programmes on the box, Hardeep Singh Kohli appears to have landed himself the perfect niche for a live comedy show. His all-conquering Indian Takeaway is a mix of…
My Comedy Hero: Martin Mor on Hovis Presley
10 Jun 2013
Martin Mor praises the late Hovis Presly, the 'only genuis comic' he has ever worked with
My comedy hero is the late great Hovis Presley. Now I realise that a lot of people reading this won’t know who he is, but I would say of all the acts that I have worked with during my career (and I have worked with most of the UK’s big names), Hovis was…
Sigur Rós - Kveikur
7 Jun 2013
Icelandic band taking over the world with seventh studio album
It’s hardly Dylan going electric, but when early word got out about Sigur Rós’ new tougher direction, some fans of the moody Icelandic band whipped themselves into an ethereal lather. The truth behind the myths of their seventh studio album, Kveikur, is…
The Returned
6 Jun 2013
French horror TV series takes the genre to a whole new level
Screen zombies have come a long way from the arms-outstretched, murderously drooling, knuckleheaded empty vessels of yore. Even running zombies seem a little old hat now. If you’re going to bring people back from the dead, do it the French way à la The…
TV review: Arne Dahl
6 Jun 2013
Too much Scandinavian TV drama kills Scandinavian TV drama?
It’s probably a sign that we’ve just been thoroughly spoilt by the raft of quality TV dramas from Scandinavia that Arne Dahl seems like a slight disappointment. It certainly had all the ingredients to be the next Killing or Bridge: a team of likeable…
Scottish festivals 2013 - An A-Z of the best summer festivals
17 May 2013
The best festivals of music, film, food, cycling and more taking place in Scotland 2013
When it comes to festivals, Scotland really doesn’t hold back. From Orkney to Byres Road, muddy fields to stately homes, the growing number of them cater to all tastes, styles and budgets. Our A-Z guide profiles Scotland’s best summer jamborees, the…
Gillian Anderson and Eve Myles return to TV in non-sci-fi roles for The Fall and Frankie
16 May 2013
The stars of The X-Files and Torchwood respectively play a homicide detective and cheery nurse
As a serial killer gently bathes the corpse of a woman he has just strangled, the investigating officer on the murderer’s trail is getting intimate with a burly Belfast cop in her hotel room. It’s not a scene for the faint of heart but The Fall has…
Interview: NYC comedian Judah Friedlander set for 2013 UK dates
15 May 2013
He’s not here to deliver a message. Even if he has a presidential campaign to run
For those familiar with Judah Friedlander from 30 Rock or any number of movies from American Splendor to The Wrestler, you will no doubt picture a slightly doleful-looking dude with much hair, thick glasses and an array of trucker hats. Rather than…
Comedian Helen Arney talks geeks and nerds
15 May 2013
The physics graduate/musical comedian is back with her new dream gig
A quick glance at Helen Arney’s June gig list says everything you need to know about the kind of audience she attracts. Among them are Lab Notes and Call My Genetically Engineered Bluff at the Cheltenham Science Festival, while in Scotland she has two…
Jay Lafferty shares her thoughts on her comedy hero Dylan Moran
15 May 2013
Why Moran's Bernard Black is 'the poster boy for the manchild'
I have always had a thing for dark haired, unshaven, slightly dishevelled gents. I'm a big fan of the sardonic drunk who turns up at parties to roll his eyes and make sardonic quips which is why Dylan Moran is not only my comedy hero but something of an…
Eddie Izzard embarks on 2013 UK tour
15 May 2013
Five things you might not know about the comedian
1. If you happened to be dotting around Edinburgh during August in the early 80s, you may have witnessed Eddie Izzard doing some street performing. In 1991, he was nominated for the Perrier (Frank Skinner won) while his links with the festival now are…
Reginald D Hunter set for 2013 UK tour
15 May 2013
Hitting the trail on the back of fresh controversy
You could say that an extra dollop of spice has been added to Reginald D Hunter’s national tour after a furore that could be described as misguided on almost everyone’s part but the comic himself. When the Professional Footballers Association invited…
TV review: Banshee
29 Apr 2013
Getting through Alan Ball’s new show requires a strong stomach and powerful painkillers
If Six Feet Under was Alan Ball’s attempt to create a Shakespearean family drama set among the funeral parlours of LA, then Banshee (Sky Atlantic, Mon, 10.15pm) might be his attempt at pitching himself for a Bourne writing gig. While Ball may be…
Sheila Rock - Punk +
17 Apr 2013
Superb and powerfully put-together photo-history of punk
Sheila Rock’s superb photo-history of the short-lived but aftershock-long punk scene ends with a series of John Lydon shots. It’s 1980 and punk is indeed dead, the ex-Pistols sneermonger now fully ensconced in his new PiL project. Mooching around in a…
Interview: Bill Bailey talks about his latest show, Qualmpeddler
16 Apr 2013
'It's about reflecting ideas and thoughts that float about in an intangible way'
A press release for a Bill Bailey tour is often more entertaining than some comedians’ entire stage careers. There’s no way that this ‘Swiftian satirist,’ the archetypal hippie materialist and owner of a Dandelion Mind did not have a hand in publicity…
Jo Caulfield presents... The Speakeasy - Scottish Storytelling Centre, Edinburgh, Tue 9 Apr 2013
16 Apr 2013
This spoken word/comedy evening presents a more easy-going, relaxed alternative to stand-up shows
‘They don’t like this kind of thing on a Friday night at Jongleurs.’ It’s a statement that could apply to just about every act on The Speakeasy bill, but it’s spoken by Andrew Learmonth, a comedian who has just revealed the story of his prematurely-born…
Gary Delaney tells us what it takes to be a one-liner king
16 Apr 2013
'The first joke is on the bedside table and the second joke is on the toilet, and so on'
While in front of a comedy crowd that could turn at any given minute, a stand-up needs to rely on a solid memory to make sure there are no juicy lulls for a heckler to bite into. When that comedian is a one-line/punchline gagmeister, it’s even more…
Ben Verth talks about his comedy hero, Peter Richardson
16 Apr 2013
Edinburgh comic Verth reveres the architect behind The Comic Strip club and TV series
My comedy hero is Peter Richardson. 'Who?' I hear you ask. Richardson was the driving force behind London’s Comic Strip club during the early 80s Alternative Comedy boom, and was the main writer and director of, and actor in, its spin-off TV show, The…
Five things you might not know about Micky Flanagan
16 Apr 2013
The Cockney comic has lived past lives as a fish monger, dish washer and teacher
1 His first full-time job was as a stand boy in Billingsgate fish market where he boiled and measured various types of shellfish, earning the fairly serious sum of £250 a week. He later washed dishes in New York and went into teacher training but was…
Wrestler, author and 'spoken word artist' Mick Foley delivers tales from inside and outside the ring
16 Apr 2013
The former grappler is touring the UK with his latest spoken word tour
For those who remember Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler, there are fewer sights sadder in showbusiness than a once-great star trying to reclaim their past and ending up making an utter fool of themselves. Mick Foley made sure that this would not be his…
Review: Mad Mad Series 6 - Don Draper and co return with the stench of death everywhere
10 Apr 2013
Sixth and penultimate series screens Sky Atlantic, Wed 10 Apr, 10pm
Could Mad Men be the most subtle TV drama ever made? While fans of The Sopranos and The Wire tuned in mainly for the bold writing and brilliant characters, there was always the juicy carrot of some rat or business associate being brutally dispatched. As…
