It’s Halloween this Tuesday and Judah Friedlander is challenging the idea of “American Exceptionalism” with is debut Netflix stand-up comedy… MORE
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Almost a year to the day he was first introduced, the wildly popular Saturday Night Live sketch starring Tom Hanks… MORE
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Musical comedy duo Bret McKenzie and Jemaine Clement reunite for a string of live dates after solo roles in Hollywood and on TV
OK, band meeting! The Flight of the Conchords have announced that they are preparing to tour the UK and Ireland. The musical comedy duo, comprising Bret McKenzie and Jemaine Clement, will be dusting down classics such as Hiphopopotamus v Rhymenoceros, Foux du Fafa and Business Time for a string of dates starting at the Hammersmith Apollo, London, in April 2018.
McKenzie and Clement met at Victoria University of Wellington in New Zealand and began to play genre-mashing spoof songs at fringe nights, gaining an international audience with their award-winning set at the Edinburgh festival in 2002. The following year they returned to Edinburgh and played the Gilded Balloon, where their show High on Folk was heralded by the Guardian as a “late-night gem”. After recording a BBC radio series and winning a Grammy for best comedy album, they made two seasons of an Emmy-nominated TV series for HBO, charting the band’s attempts to break America.
Continue ReadingThis Tuesday night, actress and comedian Amy Sedaris cordially invites you into her home with the premiere of her new… MORE
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Since his death, a complicated picture of the comedian has emerged. We were friends at the height of his fame and I saw his cruelty first hand. Others say that he later changed, before his drinking spiralled out of control
Carl Donnelly was driving on Monday morning when his phone rang. He could not pick up, but when he saw who had called – someone who was friends with him and Sean Hughes – he guessed what was coming. He called back and learned that Hughes, just 51 years old, had been picked up from his home by an ambulance on Sunday night. On the way to hospital he went into cardiac arrest. He died shortly afterwards. It transpired that he was also suffering from cirrhosis of the liver.
Related: Sean Hughes obituary
We were honest with each other and listened to one another’s insecurities continually. He was very open with me
In the last year, since his mum died, the drinking spiralled. It was horrible. We’d speak at 10am and he’d be pissed
Continue ReadingJerrod Carmichael locked in a two’fer at FOX this week. Carmichael recently inked an overall development deal with the network… MORE
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Today we bring you another exclusive clip from IFC’s sketch comedy show, the Baroness von Sketch Show. We’ve all been… MORE
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The Daily Show is setting up shop in Chicago all week long with a week of episodes in the Windy… MORE
“The Daily Show” recreates “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” as they kick off a week of shows in Chicago appeared first on The Laugh Button.
By his mid-20s he had scooped the Perrier award and landed his own TV show. But Sean Hughes never wanted to be a stadium standup. Mark Steel and Rhona Cameron pay tribute to a troubled talent – and we pick some of his best gags
I knew Sean from before he won the Perrier award in 1990. He was a Crystal Palace fan and we used to go to the football together. I remember going to a match with him in the early 90s, when he was on the telly quite a lot, and I took him down the pub with me. He was really warm with people and we ended up staying the evening. There was a genuine charm to him that was way beyond showbiz. He liked that world: being sat in the corner of a pub with a load of people who’d been at the football. Being funny with them but not in a show-off way.
Related: Sean Hughes obituary
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Continue ReadingFrom the bumbling misadventures of Sean’s Show to the jaunty misanthropy of his later standup material, Hughes – who has died aged 51 – was a master of telling messy truths
There were two distinct chapters to Sean Hughes’ career: the comedy prodigy and ubiquitous TV star, then – after a period of silence – the rumpled refusenik, a celebrity opt-out ploughing an ever grouchier (but just as funny) furrow along standup’s margins. Not many comics run away from commercial success, but at the turn of the century Hughes quit standup for several years. “I found myself playing 4,000-seater venues packed with 14-year-old girls screaming at me,” he said. “That wasn’t why I did comedy.”
Related: Sean Hughes: comedian dies aged 51
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