Brian Donaldson

Noel Fielding's Luxury Comedy

The Boosh performer's latest TV effort abounds in surrealism but lacks coherence... and jokes

2 Feb 2012

Ahead of his new gaudily-coloured clutter-fest, Noel Fielding admitted that making this solo series left him feeling a bit unhinged. After ingesting just a few minutes of Noel Fielding’s Luxury Comedy (E4, Thu, 10pm) only the most avid Boosh fan will…

Interview: Comedian Chris Ramsey's Offermation

The genial Geordie discusses offensiveness and award nominations

2 Feb 2012

During Chris Ramsey’s stand-up appearance on Russell Howard’s Good News from 2010, there’s a moment when the camera cuts to a shot of happy, laughing people. In among them is one seemingly less than amused woman who appears to have taken offence at the…

Late'n'Live Guide to Comedy

The greatest hits of the legendary Fringe bear-pit makes an appearance on TV

2 Feb 2012

‘The performing equivalent of self-harm’ is how Johnny Vegas describes the bearpit hell of the notorious Late’n’Live. Brainchild of the Gilded Balloon’s head honcho Karen Koren, this Edinburgh Fringe staple has been sending chills down the spines of…

Keara Patricia Murphy: My comedy hero - Billy Connolly

'He destroyed me. No one else comes close'

2 Feb 2012

I first heard Billy Connolly on a record of my dad’s when I was seven. He was talking about welly boots and the Barras and telling funny stories about Jesus being born in the Gallowgate and not Galilee. He created a magical world outside my window that…

5 things you might not know about Tiffany Stevenson

The actress comedian from Talk Radio to Show Me The Funny

2 Feb 2012

1 Tiffany Stevenson began her career in the entertainment biz as an actress and has appeared onscreen in The Office, took a lead role in gritty indie feature Spinning Candyfloss and popped up in Dizzee Rascal’s ‘Dirtee Cash’ video [see below]. 2 Her…

Profile: Louise Welsh, author of The Cutting Room and Naming the Bones

The crime author is set to appear at three literary events this month

1 Feb 2012

Ever since she exploded onto the Scottish literary scene in 2002 with her literary detective novel The Cutting Room, Louise Welsh has proved to be an astute explorer of human frailty. She describes her quartet of acclaimed novels as quests in which an…

Interview: Eowyn Ivey - author of The Snow Child

Debut author discusses tale of heartbreak and hope set in 1920s Alaska

1 Feb 2012

Give us five words to describe The Snow Child? Alaskan. Wild. Magical. Rugged. Tender. Name one author who should be more famous than they are now? M Allen Cunningham. His novel The Green Age of Asher Witherow is one of the finest I have ever…

Jeet Thayil - Narcopolis

Bombay-centric social drama with tangible atmosphere but little narrative drive

1 Feb 2012

(Faber) Narcopolis begins and ends with the word ‘Bombay’. Although several individuals vie for centre stage in poet Jeet Thayil’s debut novel, the main character here is India’s most densely populated city. Viewed as a solemn and dangerous hive…

February round-up: best books on Dickens

Simon Callow, Constance Moore, Jenny Hartley and Ruth Richardson celebrate the novelist's legacy

27 Jan 2012

In February, the rest of the UK will be joining all of dear old London town by taking to our foggy streets in honour of Charles John Huffam Dickens’ bicentenary. Well, perhaps not, but the media has certainly done its best to remind us that 2012 isn’t…

In Process and Great Debates

The Scottish Writers’ Centre's events are keeping the country's literary talent in the spotlight

9 Jan 2012

When it comes to getting the literary community ablaze with conversation or putting scribes under the microscope, the Scottish Writers’ Centre seem to have it down to a fine art just now. In Process is their monthly series of events in which a writer…

Round-up of 2011: Comedy

Tim Key, Tommy Tiernan, Stephen Merchant, Luke Wright and Jerry Sadowitz make our laugh-list

9 Jan 2012

Tim Key Having netted Edinburgh’s big fat award for comedy in 2009, the former Coward blasted back in August with an absolute corker of a show. Masterslut was a masterclass of interactive improv raised to glorious levels by the most memorable use of a…

Author and satirist Nick Revell on coming back to comedy

The prominent 80s comic has several dates lined up at The Stand

6 Jan 2012

As one of the original voices from the 1980s Comedy Store era, Nick Revell has been round a block or two. Having earned a Perrier nomination in 1987, his stand-up career seemed to be flying, but in 1992 he decided to have a break and concentrate on…

Meanwhile, It's Will and Greg

Will Andrews and Greg McHugh revive their Ugly Kid sketch talents for radio

6 Jan 2012

On first hearing that Will Andrews and Greg McHugh have collaborated for sketch work under the moniker of Will & Greg, the cynical might believe this to be a forced pairing simply to fulfil a US TV show pun. Reflect on this, cynics: the duo’s working…

Preview of 2012 - Irvine Welsh's Skagboys

Renton, Sick Boy et al are revisited in this Trainspotting prequel

6 Jan 2012

Wonder how Renton, Sick Boy, Spud and co got to be the drugged-up life-rejecting Leith loons in Trainspotting? Well, wonder no more, as the publication of Skagboys brings us a bit more background on the individual and social circumstances revolving…

5 things you might not know about Nick Helm

The former 'dinner lady' and 2011 Best Joke of the Fringe winner doesn't get on with Alice Cooper

5 Jan 2012

1 Among Nick Helm’s pre-showbiz jobs have been as a ‘dinner lady’ at a secondary school for boys, counting traffic and working in the café of a garden centre. 2 In 2001, he formed a theatre company called Bad Ash Productions whose oeuvre includes I…

The top books for a healthy start to 2012

Dieting and exercise books from Tracy Griffen, Mike Dow, John Briffa and more

5 Jan 2012

It’s that time of year when the season’s jollities come back to haunt you. Stepping on the scales or glancing in the mirror can be a pretty scary prospect. Fortunately, you’re never short of advice in written form come January. Edinburgh-based personal…

Queen of quirk Zooey Deschanel stars in formulaic geeky comedy New Girl

The sitcom falls in neatly with The Big Bang Theory, Scrubs et al

5 Jan 2012

Adorkability. ‘Jess Daly’ has this in spades, and it’s the x-factor that led US executives to immediately order up a bunch of extra episodes after New Girl (Channel 4, Fri 6 Jan, 8.35pm) became the Fox network’s highest-rated autumn sitcom debut in a…

Janey Godley: My comedy hero - Jerry Sadowitz

The chatty comedian booked the hate-fuelled magician in the early 80s

5 Jan 2012

My comedy hero is Jerry Sadowitz and always has been, ever since the day my slightly mad (now deceased) brother Jim brought him into my bar in the early 80s and begged me to ‘put him on’. Which we reluctantly did. I have yet to see anyone as…

Marcus Berkmann - A Shed of One’s Own

Occasionally hilarious, occasionally turgid treatise on middle-age

5 Jan 2012

(Little, Brown) What is middle-age? Is it a fixed number or a fluid miasma of values, outlooks and opinions? Marcus Berkmann, probably correctly, believes it could strike at any time (you could even get a middle-aged teenager) but is perhaps more…

Mull Historical Society - City Awakenings

Varied collection of often backwards-looking eccentricities

5 Jan 2012

(Xtra Mile Recordings) A decade after the Mull Historical Society debut Loss, Colin MacIntyre marks the event with another gentle, curious and occasionally awkward platter, as they called them back in the early 00s. In some ways, MHS are becoming…

Chris Isaak - Beyond the Sun

Listenable but redundant take on some of Sun Records' finest

5 Jan 2012

(Vanguard Records/Rhino) During its 1950s heyday, Sun Records churned out standards by the bucketload from the likes of Elvis, Cash and Orbison. During the recording of Beyond the Sun, David Lynch’s favourite bequiffed rockabilly star was presumably…

Interview: Lucy Wood, author of Diving Belles

The writer's debut publication is a set of short stories about hopes, regrets and memories

19 Dec 2011

Give us five words to describe Diving Belles? Short stories reimagining Cornish folklore. Name one author who should be more famous than they are now? I think everyone should read George Mackay Brown’s fiction and poetry, for his evocation of…

The Hot 100 2011: 100-50

The definitive list of Scottish creative talent

16 Dec 2011

100: Gordon Ferris. Kilmarnock crime author makes good. The already packed Scottish crime writing field has finally found a bit of elbow room for another burgeoning talent. Joining the likes of Rankin, Brookmyre, McDermid and co is this Ayrshire-born…

Hot 100 2011 - No. 49 to 1

The definitive list of Scottish creative talent

16 Dec 2011

The Hot 100 is the definitive list of Scottish creative talent. From fashion designers to performance artists, everyone who has made a sizeable splash in 2011 has a place in this countdown. It’s for people who’ve created a buzz, but it’s also about…

The Hot 100 2011 - No. 25: Greg McHugh interview

Man behind Fresh Meat and Gary: Tank Commander

16 Dec 2011

When it comes to arresting openings in new TV comedy-dramas during 2011, it’s unlikely that anything came close to Channel 4’s Fresh Meat. The sight of Greg McHugh, naked from the waist down, blow-drying a row of Peking ducks won’t leave many witness…

The Hot 100 2011 - No. 56: Freya Mavor

Moving on after being Mini McGuinness in Skins

16 Dec 2011

All good things, they say, must come to an end. So with the Skins policy of changing casts every two series, Freya Mavor may well be currently filming her final scenes of the popular E4 show. ‘I feel petrified of leaving my baby behind,’ Edinburgh’s…

What to watch this Christmas: TV highlights

Little Crackers, Great Expectations, Hacks and True Stories: Sarah Palin among the top TV Xmas picks

13 Dec 2011

When it comes to Christmas television traditions, you could rely on a Morecambe & Wise special, The Great Escape on Boxing Day and trying to guess who would fall asleep first at HM’s shrill message-sending. It may have some way to go to be considered a…

Geordie stand-up Gavin Webster on irony, young people and The Stand

Man behind Fringe show All Young People Are C**ts revisits Scotland

13 Dec 2011

When Newcastle comic Gavin Webster brought his show to the Fringe in August, news broke that you imagine would have had him rubbing his hands. Asterisked-up to the max, the provocatively titled All Young People Are C**ts was made heavily topical when…

Interview: Allan Wilson - Wasted in Love

The debut novelist on his collection of vignettes about love, lies, break-ups and betrayal

12 Dec 2011

Give us five words to describe Wasted in Love? Raymond Carver shagging Arab Strap. Name one author who should be more famous than they are now and why? Agnes Owens. Funny, tender and honest, her writing is about the lives of everyday, working…

Simon Armitage - The Death of King Arthur

The Yorkshire poet follows his Gawain translation with another medieval epic

12 Dec 2011

(Faber) In 2006 Simon Armitage embarked upon the commissioned task of translating Sir Gawain and the Green Knight for a modern audience. Encountering some resistance from the ‘lady on the desk’ at the British Library when he requested a peek at the…

Douglas Coupland & Graham Roumieu - Highly Inappropriate Tales for Young People

Pacy but insubstantial short story collection

12 Dec 2011

(Heinemann) For anyone who has a glance at the cover of this book and believes that all they have spied is a cute illustration aimed at kids might want to take a closer look. It suggests that reading this collaboration between Generation X writer…

The best comedy DVDs to give as Christmas presents in 2011

Tim Vine, Tommy Tiernan and Richard Herring among highlights

7 Dec 2011

What does it say about America that ventriloquist Jeff Dunham is among that nation’s top earning comedians? In 2009, Forbes.com placed him third behind Jerry Seinfeld and Chris Rock, having banked an estimated $30m. In response, an astonished Dunham…

Tunng - This is Tunng: Live from the BBC

Warped magic of eccentric east London glitch folk collective

7 Dec 2011

(Full Time Hobby) With a line-up alteration or two, eccentric east London collective Tunng have gone from glitchy cut and pasters to singalong folksters. Their This is Tunng compilation features bouncy numbers (‘Jenny Again’, ‘Bullets’) from 2010’s…

St Andrew's Day - The best books from Scotland

Our editors pick highlights from Scottish books through history

25 Nov 2011

First up, The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886). The ultimate doppelgänger novel, Robert Louis Stevenson’s fiction about the goodly doctor and his hairy malevolent side may be officially set in London but to all intents and purposes this is a…

Five things you might not know about the Pajama Men

Some fun facts about comedy duo Shenoah Allen and Mark Chavez

16 Nov 2011

1 The Pajama Men are Shenoah Allen and Mark Chavez who met at high school in Albuquerque, while performing in a string of comedy improvisation groups. They got their big break at Chicago’s Second City, the legendary comedy and theatre mecca which helped…

Omid Djalili: Tour of Duty - interview

The British-Iranian stand-up discusses TV, touring and unintentional slapstick ahead of his new tour

15 Nov 2011

There is mounting evidence that Omid Djalili may be the most accident-prone comedian in stand-up. Setting aside the time he knocked his chicken salad onto this interviewer’s shoes in 2002, his onstage falls are fast becoming the stuff of legend. At the…

Frankie Boyle's Tramadol Nights

The comedian's TV show is a mix of decent stand-up material and woeful sketches

15 Nov 2011

Curious thing the moral barometer. After the faecal flood which surrounded the original Channel 4 showing of Tramadol Nights this time last year, some judicious cutting has been made to the DVD version. Gone is the Jordan/Harvey routine from episode two…

Don Paterson, OBE and bard of Dundee - profile

The Scottish poet is the subject of three different events this month

15 Nov 2011

In a 2009 interview, Don Paterson insisted that the overriding characteristics of his work were ‘stupidity, incompetence and meanness of spirit’. A large handful of sodium chloride can be taken with that statement, as the bard of Dundee is clearly being…

Interview: Selma Dabbagh - author of Out of It

The author answers questions about her debut novel, about a family struggling to survive in Gaza

15 Nov 2011

Give us five words to describe Out of It? Girl. Gun. Boy. Sea. Fence. What was the last book you read? I have spent the last three days in the mood of Hangover Square by Patrick Hamilton. A brownish, fuggy, alcoholic London novel set in 1939, it…

Comedian Carey Marx on his heroes

Woody Allen, Lennny Bruce, Mitch Hedberg and Louis CK are among the former magician's idols

15 Nov 2011

When I started out in comedy I was a magician and my act largely consisted of pulling vegetables out of people’s ears. I didn’t have any heroes because there is a dearth of vegetable-based magic acts. As I moved into pure stand-up (I like to think what…

Channel Hopper - Life's Too Short

Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant team up with short actor Warwick Davis for new comedy mock-doc

15 Nov 2011

When Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant set about their next major BBC project, they must have wondered whether to go for the docu-drama fakery of The Office or the celeb-heavy naturalism of Extras. In the end they squashed the two together for Life’s…

Top children's books on sale for Christmas

New titles from Jacqueline Wilson, Julia Donaldson, Francesca Simon and David Walliams

15 Nov 2011

While the December market is traditionally slow for adult fiction, when it comes to kids books, it’s a ripe old time of year. This winter there are books from some familiar names and favourite characters which won’t look bad popping out of a woolly…

Sarah Hall - The Beautiful Indifference

The Booker nominee delivers a short story collection with an eye for spectacular imagery

15 Nov 2011

(Faber) Four books into her literary career and a Booker nomination in the locker (for 2004’s The Electric Michelangelo), Sarah Hall is being touted as one of the key British voices of her generation. There is little doubt that she can weave some…

Umberto Eco - On Ugliness

Entertaining collection of art history essays edited by the Italian author

15 Nov 2011

(MacLehose Press) Just as notions of beauty are very much in the eye of the beholder, what constitutes ‘ugly’ can be viewed differently across centuries and continents. Football teams who ‘play ugly’ might still end up as winners, while being told by…

Don Delillo - The Angel Esmeralda

Challenging but ultimately rewarding collection of short stories spanning the author's career

18 Oct 2011

(Picador) Is anyone ever truly happy in a Don DeLillo universe? As the astronaut narrator of ‘Human Moments in World War III’ puts it, ‘happiness is not a fact of this experience’. The profundities and quandaries of existence weigh down mightily upon…

Padgett Powell, author of You & I - interview

The writer follows up his postmodern 'questions' novel with a book-length dialogue

18 Oct 2011

When Padgett Powell was a boy, he knew little of the settled life. With a trucker father, his family was constantly on the move and he reckons that he attended ten different schools and lived in 17 houses during his perpetual-motion upbringing. Perhaps…

Mark Nelson's comedy hero: Doug Stanhope

One charmingly profane comic praises another

18 Oct 2011

Naturally being Scottish, I have always regarded Billy Connolly as an inspiration and probably the inventor of modern stand-up. Growing up I always loved Jack Dee and Frank Skinner and now as a comedian myself there are comics I work with whom I…

Dave Gorman's Powerpoint Presentation - interview

The Gorman-hunting, Googlewhacker presents latest high-concept show

18 Oct 2011

When Dave Gorman gets a chance to look back on his career, he can be mightily proud to have pretty much single-handedly created a new kind of stage comedy. Even though he’s not sure what it should be called exactly. ‘They were narrative shows which…

V Campbell, author of 'historical teen action adventure quest' Viking Gold - interview

18 Oct 2011

Give us five words to describe Viking Gold? Historical teen action adventure quest. Name one author who should be more famous than they are now? John Christopher for his young adult sci-fi. My husband and I read his books together and they left us…

The Midnight Beast - Book At Us Now

Unfunny pop-parody book designed to cash in on upcoming TV fame

18 Oct 2011

(Coronet) ‘We mock the living hell out of stuff for a living,’ claim London pop parody trio The Midnight Beast. Even in this disposable age, simply poking fun at more talented people can only stretch so far before the game is up. Success rarely…