Battersea Arts Centre, London, and online Audience participation at arm’s length via screen happily injects some welcome randomness into this six-person improvised sketch showHow do you do impro without an audience? That Covid has made life unforgiving…
Continue ReadingAlmost 600 cultural groups across England to benefit from latest funding roundComedy clubs, circuses, choirs and theatres across England are in line to receive a share of £76m of government funding for the cultural sector.The Military Wives Choirs, Som…
Continue ReadingThis week, the UK government announced £257m in emergency arts funding – we hear from some of those who missed out, complaining of baffling applications and a lack of guidanceOf course it was disappointing not to be successful in this round of the cult…
Continue ReadingI’ve worked as the only person of colour on improv nights for years and found problems – and potential. Now diverse groups are finding laughs a more inclusive wayIn improv, when one comic decides another performer’s scene has run its course, they dart …
Continue ReadingIn the UK’s most southwesterly county a burgeoning standup scene thrives everywhere from remote village halls and old bakeries to the cliffside Minack theatre A cliff edge, an old bakery or the space next to the tea-hatch in a village hall aren’t stand…
Continue ReadingThe award-winning standup on the things that make her laugh the mostVictoria Wood when I was 14. I couldn’t believe this one person could have so many people in the palm of their hand. Related: The Guide: Staying In – sign up for our home entertainmen…
Continue ReadingBridget Christie was a bag of nerves, Suzi Ruffell played Covid for laughs and Stephen K Amos was so rusty he needed a clipboard … top comics on the thrill of returningLockdown was the longest I’ve not gigged since I started in comedy. I realised how…
Continue ReadingThe comedian’s new podcast is bursting with enthusiasm for poems. If standup forces him to be funny, here he forces himself to be true‘Phwooar – Ginsy Ginsy Ginsy, I love you so much!” You won’t find that in FR Leavis. The “Ginsy” in question is beat p…
Continue ReadingCocoRosie’s call to arms, a mauling from Michelle Wolf, Arthur Jafa’s white supremacy montage and Melania Trump’s gardening … Guardian writers pick the moments that encapsulate Trump’s reign Since he’s a former real-estate tycoon, it seems fitting that…
Continue ReadingBritain’s Got Talent star Myra Dubois turns agony aunt in a show that might raise the roof in a theatre – but not onlineMyra Dubois was a staple of the cabaret scene for years before Simon Cowell came calling. Duetting with Amanda Holden, and cracking …
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