LaughRiot.co.uk

Long Tooth Edinburgh preview at Etcetera

It’s Edinburgh preview time in the Smoke again and it’s always interesting. You might see an act which is very close to being a big Edinburgh hit and you might see a train crash; it can go either way. The venue is the Etcetera Theatre above the Oxford Arms on the very salubrious Camden High Street, which is running a season of Edinburgh previews. The space is intimate (tiny)and very hot under theatre lights, but very friendly.

Long Tooth is the duo Vivienne Gibbs and Trudi Jackson playing the characters of Liz and Julie who live together, play together and perform together. The duo archetype they adopt is the dominant, bullying character and the buffoon who always manages to subvert the process and gets the laughs in the end, a tradition going back through Laurel and Hardy, all the way to Shakespeare. (more…)

Posted in Gig, Reviews | No Comments »

Jan Ravens at E4 Udderbelly

Honestly, I was stone cold sober but I swear that the venue for this gig was inside an upside-down purple cow on London’s  South Bank next to Hungerford Bridge, which made for a interesting, if somewhat surreal, setting for the evening.  As an impressionist, Jan Ravens has an impressive CV including Spitting Image and Dead Ringers which automatically put her into the “worth a listen” bracket.  The gig is part of the ongoing E4 Udderbelly series (which explains the unusual venue) currently taking place on the South Bank.

The gig wasn’t billed as a comedy event, more of “An Evening With…”, which is exactly how it played out.  The venue was about half full the majority of the audience seemed to be there to see Jan Ravens rather than to watch whichever artist happened to be performing on that night. (more…)

Posted in Gig, Reviews | No Comments »

Khorsandi headlines in West London

Knock2Bag, the LaughRiot fave in West London’s Shepherds Bush continues its tradition of strong-bills with this April’s show.

Great stand-ups Shappi Khorsandi, Scott Cappurro and Stewart Francis head the line-up on April 15th at the relaxed venue a few minutes from the new west london shopping craziness that is Westfield.

Seann Walsh, Tony Dunn, Dorian Crook, Carl Donnelly & Brian Gittins complete the strong line-up.  Tickets cost £7.  For more details contact: http://www.knock2bag.co.uk or Tel: 07870 212189

Posted in Gig, News | No Comments »

Just the Tonic at the Leicester Square Theatre, 7th March 2009

“Just  the Tonic” has found a new home at the Leicester Square Theatre (formerly The Venue) and, apart from a few technical glitches, the relationship looks set to be a happy one.  You can’t quite smell the paint from the recent refurbishment but the auditorium still feels very new and the 2 bars inside the auditorium (one either side) work very well for comedy gigs.  Drinks are served throughout the performance and the difficult job of getting the audience back to their seats after the interval becomes much easier.

The compere for this first night was Charlie Baker who warmed the crowd up with some fairly gentle interaction and a great routine featuring  his jazz vocal skills, including a hilarious version of “The Lady Is A Tramp” and his own take on updating jazz for the MTV generation.

The first of the featured acts, Gary Delaney, fired off a stream of edgy  and often surreal one-liners (or two-liners if we’re being strictly accurate) which generally stayed just on the right side of the audience’s acceptability line and confirmed his reputation as a great gag writer (he also works with Tom Binns on the Ivan Brackenbury material) . (more…)

Posted in Gig, Reviews | No Comments »