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Ken Cheng’s pound coin gag voted Edinburgh fringe’s funniest joke

August 21, 2017TheGuardian

Comedian who quit Cambridge University for online poker says both his careers are based on ‘extreme punishment or reward’

They say comedy can be found in the most banal of subjects, and the 2017 winner of Dave’s Funniest Joke of the Fringe award puts that theory to the test.

Proving that even money can be funny, Ken Cheng has won this year’s accolade with his one-liner on the UK’s redesigned currency: “I’m not a fan of the new pound coin, but then again, I hate all change.”

Mark Thomas review – comic gambles on his audience in a lively show

August 14, 2017TheGuardian

Summerhall, Edinburgh
The political comic mixes debate about Britain’s future with confessional memoir in an odd hybrid that solicits contributions from the crowd

Mark Thomas has called this latest fringe outing The Show that Gambles on the Future, which you’d peg as a reference to Britain’s Brexit vote. It isn’t, or not explicitly. The campaigning comic’s new set (he alternates these days between standup and solo theatre shows) is an interactive affair, soliciting audience proposals for what the near-future holds. Thomas then reads out these written submissions, joking about some, canvassing support for others, and peeling off to perform standup about growing up in south London at the heel of a terrifying dad.

Alex Salmond … Unleashed review – Edinburgh show is all bark and no bite

August 13, 2017TheGuardian

Assembly Rooms, Edinburgh
The former first minister of Scotland and ex-MP promises a political kiss and tell, but while a convivial host, fails to deliver the goods

When the former first minister of Scotland and now ex-MP Alex Salmond announced this last-minute fringe run, it sold out faster than you can say “independence in Europe”. Perhaps punters were seduced by the promise of (as the title runs) “Alex Salmond … Unleashed”. He’s been promising to kiss and tell, hinting on the Today programme at a story involving – of all things – sado-masochism and Kirsty Wark. Sure enough, the show begins (after a rousing reception from the crowd) with Salmond theatrically removing his tie. He’s buttoned up no more, and we buckle up for juicy gossip from behind the scenes of Scottish and UK politics.

But that’s not what we get. Instead, Unleashed is an hour of music, clubbable chat with a special guest, and some reflections on Scotland’s historical ties to Europe. (Each show will have a different theme.) Today’s visitor, greeted with surprise by the crowd, is the “Brexit bulldog”, David Davis – to whom we have to be nice, Salmond instructs us, because they’re pals. If we hadn’t been told, we’d guess from the chummy conversation that follows. Two old guys, two upholstered leather armchairs: think gentleman’s club and you wouldn’t be wide of the mark.

Stars from comedy’s punk past return to the Edinburgh fringe

July 22, 2017TheGuardian

They were at the vanguard of political comedy. Now Alexei Sayle, Craig Ferguson and Sue Perkins are heading back to the festival, as it celebrates its 70th birthday

Unknown talents and student hopefuls head for the Edinburgh festival fringe at this time of year, aiming to break into the entertainment industry. This summer, however, a loud and anarchic blast from comedy’s punk past is also on the bill.

A slew of stars, including Alexei Sayle, a comic hero of the 1980s, and Sue Perkins, who first made it big at the festival 20 or so years ago, are returning to try their luck as the fringe celebrates its 70th birthday.

On the fringe of fame: star comics caught on camera in their early days at Edinburgh

July 15, 2017TheGuardian

A stash of film shot in the 1990s chronicles the rise of comedy’s big names including Steve Coogan, Rob Brydon and Jo Brand

As the Edinburgh festival prepares to celebrate its 70th anniversary, a trove of portraits has emerged, cataloguing the history of some of the most celebrated comedians from its fringe.

The photographs feature Michael McIntyre, Eddie Izzard, Jo Brand and others, from when they were struggling for laughs in the back rooms of Edinburgh pubs. They came to light when the photographer Rich Hardcastle was putting together a book to mark his 25 years in the business.

Related: 25 years of shooting comedians

On stage their whole performance is an amplification of their personality. When they’re off stage they’re sort of normal

Alex Salmond to star in Edinburgh Fringe show

July 11, 2017TheGuardian

Ex-first minister to host Alex Salmond Unleashed – billed as mix of comedy, music, political reminiscence and chats with guests

Alex Salmond vowed to bounce back after losing his parliamentary seat last month. “You’ve not seen the last of my bonnet and me,” he said, paraphrasing a Jacobite song.

The former Scottish National party leader and ex-first minister of Scotland is aiming to fulfil that prediction next month, though not with a return to frontline politics.

Confronting my own mortality in my 20s has forced me to make the most of life | Tom Gockelen-Kozlowski

July 10, 2017TheGuardian

A spiteful genetic disease has meant regular chemotherapy for the last four years. But it’s also made me appreciate life all the more

• Tom Gockelen-Kozlowski is a journalist and comedian

The chemotherapy ward. Surely one of the most fearsome places imaginable, filled with the ill, the dying, the victims of that universal disease: mortality. This month will be the fourth anniversary of the first of my own, now monthly, visits to Guy’s hospital’s Cancer Centre in the shadow of the Shard in central London. Four years. Obviously most people get chemo for only a few months so this is a pretty rare experience.

Comedians for Corbyn? They were keeping shtoom – or serenading Farage

June 9, 2017TheGuardian

Standup is supposedly a leftie haven. But from what I saw this week, the scene offered little support for the Labour leader – and, despite some droll insights, a lack of real debate

Where were you when you heard the exit poll? I was at a comedy show: Matt Forde’s Election Party Lock-In at Soho theatre in London, to be precise. The satirist, self-proclaimed Blairite and host of Dave TV’s Unspun had just canvassed his (all-white, all-male) politician panel for predictions, which ranged between a 45- and 75-seat Tory majority. Cut to David Dimbleby on the BBC live feed, the dropping of a political bombshell – and raucous delight and disbelief in this subterranean room. Comedy is about surprise, right? Here was a bigger shock than anyone present anticipated.

I spent the final week of the election campaign seeking out live political comedy. Away from the TV screens, able to be as current, candid and non-partisan as they pleased, what were comedians saying about May v Corbyn? One of the country’s most venerable political jokers is Andy Zaltzman, whose Bugle podcast enjoyed a rare live outing, also at Soho. The guest co-host when I attended was Nish Kumar: another fine social commentator, whose leftwing sympathies are usually clear – although at the Bugle I attended, no one was pinning colours to masts.

‘My body shall be all yours’: the startling sex letters of Joyce, Kahlo and O’Keeffe

May 2, 2017TheGuardian

An eye-wateringly explicit new stage show celebrates erotic correspondence sent by famous figures through the ages

“I did as you told me, you dirty little girl, and pulled myself off twice when I read your letter.” He might be celebrated for his epic and allusive novels, but James Joyce came straight to the point when writing to his partner, Nora Barnacle. This was the opening salvo of a letter from 1908 and is just one of scores of explicit missives he sent her.

A new stage show is celebrating such letters of desire sent by famous figures through the centuries, whether explicit or coded, erotic or romantic. Theatre-maker Rachel Mars is curating a selection to be read aloud in the performance which is part of the Hotbed “festival of sex” at Camden People’s theatre in London. These will be interspersed with anonymised modern messages: texts, tweets and dating app sexts.

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