Fringe, day 5

Aug 16, 2013 20:53


Fringe Fatigue is a terrible yet grimly inevitable thing. It kicked in at this point, meaning we trudged out of the house at lunchtime not particularly motivated to tick any shows off the shortlist, and stood around at the Half Price Hut until a nice chap named George flyered us for his Free Fringe show, Who is Mr Kirby?. His sales patter and twinkly charm worked, and we headed to Ryan' Bar of the falling masonry for what turned out to be a bit of a variety show. We were greeted in the tiny basement bar with namebadges and Chewits and asked to contribute ideas into a hat for improv stuff. These were turned into genius bits of music by Joe Charman courtesy of a few Kaoss pads and some mad beatbox skills (I'll never forget the dubstep about Xena Warrior Princess on a time travelling elephant with penguins!). Meanwhile, Chris Gau provided some likeable standup and George Rowe gave us more longform stories which were well told and tempered with some humanity. Joe's younger brother Ben provided the art-based standup. Yes, a flipchart appeared with some very post-watershed drawings in it; fortunately he had enough charm to carry it off and convince us The Second Cumming of Christ wasn't a bit, er, wrong. Did we discover who Mr Kirby was? We did, but that would be telling. Go take a chance on these chaps and you will have an hour of amusement.

For the past few years we've seen posters for The Ginge, the Geordie and the Geek and pondered going, but never got round to it. This year it turned out to be absolutely the right thing to do, as they were showcasing their best sketches from three years of sellout shows before their new BBC Two series is broadcast. The sketches come thick and fast, and balance an Absolutely surrealness with straight-up tomfoolery; standouts for me were the mad lollipop man, the Armstrong and Miller-esque codebreakers researching why women behave weirdly and the awkward same-sex speed dating. Plus, Kevin O'Loughlin bears more than a passing resemblance to a young Peter Capaldi, with all of the frantic posturing and comic physicality. Literally cannot wait for their series to come on this Autumn; I bet it's a Comedy Unit production, because they make all the best stuff England fails to screen >_<

Mixed Doubles were waiting outside as their show was not long after GGG. With celebrity Twitter praise from such luminaries as Armando Iannucci and Clare Balding, and comparisons to Fry and Laurie, it was a tempting proposition. The quartet met at drama school (naturellement!) and offer a ton of fast-paced sketches like GGG, but the style was very different. They opened with a pair of smartphone-hooked girls to reel in the younger audiences, and wandered through lands as diverse as a convention for fictional lions with an unwanted guest, awkward competitive middle-class parents and a camp Sweeney Todd. Some of the material worked better than others, and others worked but were perhaps stretched beyond the joke mileage. They appeared to have also 'helpfully' planted their mates in the audience to keep the laughter going, and I ended up in front of someone who laughed like a demented machine gun at every. single. thing. Oh well. The gentlemen deserve a special mention- Paul Aitchison's tormented Scottish folk singer deserved far more airtime, and Will Close (who resembles Hugh Laurie ever so slightly) did the most spot-on impressions of Jools Holland and Andy Murray. I'd keep my eye on him for future greatness. On balance, an enjoyable show for a first Fringe outing, and once the kinks are ironed out it should enjoy bigger success.

We both took our Fringe-free day today for a rest, but tomorrow is our last full day, so expect me hilariously attempting to see way too many shows in a short time period, have a meltdown outside the pop-up champagne bar on the Royal Mile and have Broadway Baby give it 5 stars...

Also available at cryptogirl.dreamwidth.org :D

comedy, writing, fringe, edinburgh

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