Edinburgh festival – Page 68 – ComedyNews.Org :: Comedy News Organization

All the fun of the fringe: the best comedy to see in Edinburgh, part one

July 22, 2018TheGuardian

A drag queen who impersonates Nicola Sturgeon, Gujurati home life and a truly terrible novelist… we meet the comics behind the hottest Edinburgh festival shows

• The best comedy to see in Edinburgh, part two

Some of the most biting political satire at this year’s Edinburgh festival won’t come from ranting, right-on standups in sweaty basement venues. It will come from a 6ft 2in drag queen who occasionally bursts into Steps numbers.

Funny bones run in the family as fringe plays host to comic dynasties

July 14, 2018TheGuardian

This year’s Edinburgh festival features many young standups with parents – from Mark Steel to Gyles Brandreth – who blazed the same trail

Among the many voices booming out across comedy venues next month during Edinburgh’s fringe festival, several will sound strangely familiar. It might be the accent, the style of delivery or even the pace of the joke-telling that eventually gives away the identity of these performers.

The sons and daughters of some of the country’s best-known comedians are establishing themselves in their own right on the festival scene. And this Edinburgh will see stronger evidence than ever of a growing stream of second-generation talent.

My sense of humour was born out of my mother’s vocal gymnastics and my dad’s desire to needle people

50 shows to see at the Edinburgh fringe 2018

June 29, 2018TheGuardian

Superstar standups, daring dance, Brexit cabaret and a Bon Jovi musical … Dive into our guide to some of the shows at the world’s biggest arts festival

Gilded Balloon

The Mash Report’s Rachel Parris: ‘There was a lot of excitement and fury’

June 25, 2018TheGuardian

The whip-smart comic talks about mocking Piers Morgan and Donald Trump, mixing scorn with good cheer and moving from songs to satire

‘Determined cheerfulness is something I happen to do very well,” says Rachel Parris. If you’ve seen her live musical comedy shows, you won’t need telling: they present Parris as a wholesome West End Wendy forever on the verge of a nervous breakdown, performing songs that put a brave face on a chaotic life (The Gym Song) or – like her terrific X Factor spoof I’m Amazing – clothe sharp satire in faux-positivity.

No one who saw her excellent but unheralded stage shows ever doubted Parris’s talent, but it’s a big surprise that she’s now found her mainstream niche in political satire. Her whip-smart work on the BBC show The Mash Report has been adored – and deplored – by tens of millions, and she’s become one of the most prominent political comics in the UK and beyond.

The Mash Report’s Rachel Parris: ‘There was a lot of excitement and fury’

June 25, 2018TheGuardian

The whip-smart comic talks about mocking Piers Morgan and Donald Trump, mixing scorn with good cheer and moving from songs to satire

‘Determined cheerfulness is something I happen to do very well,” says Rachel Parris. If you’ve seen her live musical comedy shows, you won’t need telling: they present Parris as a wholesome West End Wendy forever on the verge of a nervous breakdown, performing songs that put a brave face on a chaotic life (The Gym Song) or – like her terrific X Factor spoof I’m Amazing – clothe sharp satire in faux-positivity.

No one who saw her excellent but unheralded stage shows ever doubted Parris’s talent, but it’s a big surprise that she’s now found her mainstream niche in political satire. Her whip-smart work on the BBC show The Mash Report has been adored – and deplored – by tens of millions, and she’s become one of the most prominent political comics in the UK and beyond.

Edinburgh fringe 2018 to tackle #MeToo and celebrate Blue Peter

June 6, 2018TheGuardian

Lineup for 71st edition includes hard-hitting debuts and plenty of nostalgia

An array of provocative debuts will mix with a heavy dose of nostalgia at the 71st Edinburgh fringe festival this August, as creative takes on the #MeToo movement are performed alongside a theatrical tribute to Blue Peter, the world’s longest-running children’s TV show.

Launching the 2018 fringe programme with 3,548 shows, the most in its history, the event’s chief executive, Shona McCarthy, said: “Whether this is your first or your 50th time visiting the fringe as a performer or audience member, this is a place where new discoveries wait around every corner.”

Lolly Adefope: ‘In Edinburgh I kissed a boy in the afternoon – by 4am we both had new partners’

May 29, 2018TheGuardian

On a first trip to the fringe, she was desperate for comedy to seep into her and discovered a summer camp that became a second home

Despite having lived in London for most of my life – and being a huge fan of dancing and drinking in the street – I’ve never been to Notting Hill carnival. Instead, for the past seven years, I’ve spent August in Edinburgh, either performing or working at the fringe. Admittedly, last year was my first “fallow” year – a time for the farm (my body) to recover – but I still visited for 10 days at the end, unable to accept the fear of missing out of unjust reviews and posters of comedians scratching their heads.

The first year I visited, I lived in a flat with 20 other students. At some point during the month, a couple of people moved out, so I got a cupboard all to myself. It was heavenly. I had always wanted to do comedy, but didn’t know where to start – all I knew was that Edinburgh was where it happened. So I applied for a job giving out flyers for an improv group, and after an hour of not giving out any, I politely resigned.

The best films about standup: from King of Comedy to Funny Bones

April 12, 2018TheGuardian

As Maxine Peake takes the mic to play a club comic in Funny Cow, here are five movies that capture the lacerating, soul-baring world of live comedy

There’s something so intimate, exposing and ruthless about their artform that standups make perfect symbols for the battle we all wage to assert ourselves against an unappreciative world. So most movies about standup focus on failures rather than successes – none more so than King of Comedy, Martin Scorsese and Robert De Niro’s less celebrated follow-up to Taxi Driver and Raging Bull.

Edinburgh’s double comedy winners mix humour with darker takes on life

August 26, 2017TheGuardian

Shows about relationship breakdown and homophobia pick up a prize – or two – for John Robins and Hannah Gadsby

The longest ever shortlist. The first ever joint winners. And clearly, the most indecisive judging panel ever.

It was indeed, as the publicity would have it, an “unprecedented” year for the Edinburgh comedy awards. But, if there’s a worry that the currency of these awards is being devalued, there can be no real complaints about this year’s champs: probably the two most audacious stand-up shows on the fringe, and certainly among the funniest.

‘Why did the lefty cross the road?’ How liberal Edinburgh comics are panning PC

August 25, 2017TheGuardian

A new wave of comedians probing faults in leftwing politics provoke a crucial debate, but does their exaggerated antagonism hamper the cause?

Identity politics has gone too far. PC has gone mad. These aren’t unfashionable opinions: they’re practically mainstream. What’s new in fringe comedy is that we’re now hearing it from leftwing comics. That’s both a fascinating phenomenon, and a troublesome one. Fascinating because there may be some truth in these propositions, and the left needs to interrogate them. Troublesome because standup doesn’t always favour nuance and fine margins, and one or two of these leftwing comedians – whether they’re mocking champagne socialists, rehabilitating slavery or defending the Iraq war – can start to sound (accidentally or on purpose) pretty rightwing.

Fin Taylor is pre-eminent among them – a rising star whose 2016 show Whitey McWhiteface made hay with white identity and privilege. It was an excellent show, as is its follow-up Lefty Tighty Righty Loosey, with which he again lays siege to the complacency of his (presumed to be) white, leftwing audience.

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: