standup comedy
Ayesha Hazarika, Soho Theatre review - 'politics is her patch'Thursday, 20 April 2017
What a day to open your political stand-up show, entitled State of the Nation, a few hours after Theresa May had announced a snap election. If Ayesha Hazarika needed any extra material, yesterday morning's events would certainly have supplied it.... Read more... |
Our Friend Victoria review – Victoria Wood’s genius is irreplaceableWednesday, 12 April 2017
In the closing credits of Acorn Antiques, wobbling diagonally across the screen, it says the part of Berta was taken by “Victoria Woods”. Has there ever been a lovelier, truer typo? There was only one Victoria Wood, and yet she seemed somehow to be... Read more... |
Russell Howard, Touring - 'the passion and anger are real'Wednesday, 12 April 2017
Russell Howard is in typically chipper form, and so he should be. Dismissed by some at the start of his career as just one of the slew of beige twenty-something blokes emerging in stand-up in the Noughties, he has built a solid television career and... Read more... |
The Miser, Garrick TheatreMonday, 13 March 2017
Trimmings, trimmings. They prove the final straw for Molière’s Harpagon in this new adaptation of the classic French comedy-farce. The menu for his wedding banquet – which he doesn’t want to spend a centime more on than he has to – is being... Read more... |
Miles Jupp, London PalladiumMonday, 27 February 2017
Miles Jupp starts by telling us he’s trying to fathom the kind of comic he should be, after he overheard a comment by an audience member at a show on his previous tour: he was nice, the man proffered, but what he said had taken him by surprise. So... Read more... |
Suzi Ruffell, Soho TheatreWednesday, 01 February 2017
Suzi Ruffell tells it straight: she's working-class and proud, but some people might think she's "common", which is the show's title. She has devised a quick quiz for us to check if we're working-class ourselves, and among the amusing tell-tale... Read more... |
Chris Gethard, Soho TheatreFriday, 27 January 2017
Comedy fans will be familiar with "New York neurotic" – performed mostly by Jewish writers and comics, with Woody Allen being the exemplar. Chris Gethard, however, is from New Jersey, was raised as a Catholic and is not neurotic at all. Rather, this... Read more... |
Michelle Wolf, Soho TheatreMonday, 19 December 2016
American comic Michelle Wolf was nominated for best newcomer at this year's Edinburgh Comedy Awards with this show, So Brave, but she is also a writer on The Daily Show With Trevor Noah. She's an acute observer both of human quirks and the... Read more... |
The best comedy DVDs of 2016Saturday, 10 December 2016
The period before Christmas is, inevitably, when stand-ups rush to market. With so much material now available on YouTube, fewer comics release DVDs nowadays, but some of the best still do. This is theartsdesk's selection of the best live acts... Read more... |
Tom Allen, Soho TheatreWednesday, 30 November 2016
Tom Allen may have started life in Bromley, a non-descript south London suburb, but there was always a touch of Oscar Wilde about him – whether in his dress sense or his way with words, as we have learned from previous shows. It was obvious to him... Read more... |
Susan Calman, Soho TheatreThursday, 10 November 2016
Susan Calman's latest show has a delightfully silly title – Calman Before the Storm – which neatly doesn't pin her down to any particular theme but instead allows her to riff on a wide range of subjects. It makes for a pleasing hour of... Read more... |
Romesh Ranganathan, TouringTuesday, 01 November 2016
Romesh Ranganathan has had an astonishing rise in comedy. The former teacher did his first full-length show at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2013, having made his debut there in 2010 in the newcomer competition, So You Think You're Funny? Now he's a... Read more... |
