Pleasance Dome, Edinburgh This comedy puts the audience inside the giant wooden ruse, alongside a cast who add fizz to a show with real interest in the classical ageHere is an alternative take on ancient Greece that is not straight from the Trojan hors…
Continue ReadingMonkey Barrel Comedy, EdinburghThe Massive Dad star riffs on the benefits of making comedy online, buoyed by arch good humour and high-quality gags within gagsStevie Martin’s show weighs up the differences between live and online comedy. Her career beg…
Continue ReadingCancel culture, faltering fatherhood and the life of a tennis champ are dramatised as standups including Ivo Graham, Anna Morris and Adam Riches take a theatrical path this summerSam Kissajukian spent 10 years on the Australian standup circuit but incr…
Continue ReadingSummerhall, EdinburghTim Etchells’ looping performance piece with Bert and Nasi replays a simple restaurant scene over and over with hilarious resultsLike a volley of Ken Dodd jokes or one of the more circular songs by Sparks, L’Addition tickles its au…
Continue ReadingPleasance Courtyard, EdinburghBased on real interviews, these verbatim-style sketches are often candid and funny, with some emotional revelationsJeremy rubs his nipples and calls Meryl’s vagina “David Schwimmer”. She has dubbed his todger Roger – which…
Continue ReadingPleasance Courtyard, EdinburghThe Australian comedian’s rocky 2023 is explored in PowerPoint, SMS exchanges, rap, musical comedy and online videosThe year 2023 was the worst of Lou Wall’s life, they tell us, at the start of a set recently shortlisted f…
Continue ReadingShe used to love cutting a rug – until she gave up drinking. Now, the comic has used dance to heal her wounded self-esteem – and explore the funny side of contemporary choreographyStephanie Laing admits she hasn’t been very kind to her body over the ye…
Continue ReadingPleasance Courtyard, EdinburghThe irrepressible aesthete, and lapsed primary school teacher, underwent medical trials to fund this effervescent show – and has since been hospitalisedThere’s breaking the bank to perform at the fringe – then there’s risk…
Continue ReadingPleasance Courtyard, Edinburgh Witnessing 9/11 from school as a six-year-old is one of many mental distresses recounted in the New York comic’s often piercingly bleak setWhenever you think trauma-comedy has reached its apogee, along comes a show to mak…
Continue ReadingThere are benefits and perils in talking about your personal experiences – as Richard Gadd found after his TV show went viral. So how are Edinburgh acts handling it this year?‘If you’re not in an OK place, you’re just re-traumatising yourself,” says An…
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