An English and Japanese comedy show by an Italian and a Canadian in London

I first met Katsura Sunshine back in 2017. He lives in Japan, the US and Canada and currently performs an ongoing monthly rakugo (Japanese storytelling) show  at the Leicester Square Theatre in London AND a regular monthly rakugo show at the New World Stages in New York.

A couple of months ago, I saw Sunshine’s London show, not for the first time. On that occasion he had, as his special guest, London-based Italian comic Luca Cupani.

They are together again at London’s Leicester Square Theatre this Sunday.

We talked on a Zoom call this week. Somewhat appropriately, given the multi-cultural and multi-national mix, Luca was in a hotel room in Milan, Sunshine was in a living room in Toronto and I was at the Soho Theatre Bar in London.

Luca (top left) with me (top right) and (bottom) Sunshine

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JOHN (TO SUNSHINE): How long are your monthly London and New York shows continuing?

SUNSHINE: They’re both indefinite runs at least for the next year. I’ve just been talking to the Leicester Square Theatre about next year’s dates and the New York show has also been confirmed to the end of 2023.

JOHN: Two months ago, Luca appeared in your London show. He did rakugo (for the first time) and his stand-up; and you did stand-up (for the first time) and your rakugo.

SUNSHINE: It was a lot of fun, just like ‘appreniticing’ each other. Luca is teaching me stand-up and I’m sort-of teaching him rakugo.

JOHN: So how did Luca – an Italian – get involved in performing at London’s Leicester Square Theatre with a Canadian who does traditional Japanese storytelling in New York?

LUCA: Sunshine offered me the chance to be on stage and it felt like a crazy idea so I couldn’t say No. I am enjoying being out of my comfort zone. I’m already an Italian doing comedy in English in London, so I’m all for cultural cross-over.

SUNSHINE: I met Luca eight years ago at the Edinburgh Fringe and we’ve been friends for all this time. We’ve gone to see each other’s shows. When he told me he was going back to the Edinburgh Fringe this year for the seventh time – I’ve performed there four times… Well, I know how much it costs and the producer side of me said:

“Luca, to save money, just rent a West End or Broadway theatre and add that to your resume. Or, instead of that, just join me!  I’ve already got the theatre. I’ll put a kimono on you and we’ll turn it into a thing. It would be fun to do it together!”

LUCA: And it IS fun. I quite like the rules of rakugo. Okay, I cannot yet follow all of the rules but it’s fun to try to follow some of the basic rules. It’s very different from what I normally do and that’s why I like it a lot. You show yourself as being vulnerable and, even if you fail, it is still funny for the audience… I think!

JOHN: As I understand rakugo, there are set, pre-existing stories, so you are not able to script your own performance like in stand-up comedy?

SUNSHINE: Technically, you make up the first part and then you lead the theme of your made-up material into the scripted story which has been passed-down from master to apprentice through the ages. So the first part is a little bit like stand-up comedy and the big laugh is at the end. I think Luca’s perfectly comfortable with that except he has to kneel in a kimono.

JOHN: What was the most difficult thing about doing it?

LUCA: For me, kneeling down on the stage in a position which is not very comfortable, using the props in the correct way and remembering the basic rule that you look in two different directions to portray two different characters.

In stand-up, you usually talk about yourself and you are being yourself. In rakugo you have to create a story and sketch two characters very quickly and in a different style. That’s the most difficult. And the most fun.

JOHN: Sunshine, I think in the show two months ago that was the first time you had performed Western-style stand-up. What was that like for you?

SUNSHINE: At first glance, it seems like the same as the first part of a ragugo show, but the rhythm of stand-up is different: the laughs are coming much more quickly. When I was standing in front of the audience and talking in my usual Rakugo way, I sort-of felt the audience’s slight impatience more than I would have in storyteller mode.

But that sharpened me up a bit. 

I cut the material down; I cut words down. I got to more of a stand-up comedy rhythm. It was a great feeling and quite different to performing rakugo.

JOHN: And in the show this coming Sunday… ?

SUNSHINE: We will both do some (solo) stand-up comedy and both do some (solo) rakugo. Exactly the same format as before.

It was SO much fun last time. To have someone in the dressing room with me and exchange ideas about comedy and the different types of both stand-up comedy and rakugo. It was brilliant.

For me, presenting rakugo alone in New York and London… There’s a formality to rakugo. You’re in the kimono, you bow – there’s a lot of formality – and people don’t want to insult the culture. I always have to get the audience on board… This is comedy! You can laugh! Relax!…

But when Luca and I walked out at the beginning of our dual show at the Leicester Square Theatre and the first half was each of us doing (solo) stand-up comedy, we had the audience going: WOOAAAHHHH!!

They knew the routine for stand-up comedy. You cheer or laugh your head off and the performers will give you all the better performance.

So leading into rakugo in the second half from a base of stand-up comedy which the audience already understood and could enjoy and relax with was a completely different experience. It was just so much more fun and easy to perform.

JOHN: Luca: did you learn anything from performing Japanese rakugo that you could use in your Western stand-up?

LUCA: The story I had was short but fun and it involved a lot of physical stuff. In rakugo, you use your face more often than I usually do when I talk. So I think it helped me to be more expressive. Also, if you know where you want to go, you can play a bit more in-between.

In stand-up, you need laughter all the way though. You ride on the energy of laughter, otherwise it doesn’t work. In a stand-up routine, you don’t always know where you’re going because you wait for the reaction from the audience. But, in rakugo, the set-up is way-way longer and you can prepare the audience, warm them up, play with pauses.

Last time what happened – and it wasn’t planned – was that, at the very beginning, when we introduced the show, we inadvertantly almost did some manzai which is another Japanese comedy form with two artists – one plays the smart guy, the other the foolish guy. Sunshine was smart; I was foolish. When we were talking to the audience and tried to warm them up, it became a sort-of improvised manzai that we hadn’t planned.

JOHN: And you will be performing together again?

SUNSHINE: I hope so. This is the last show of this year, then we’ll be starting up again next February, dates to be confirmed.

JOHN: Sunshine: how long has it taken you to get to this stage as a rakugo performer?

SUNSHINE: I’m in my 15th year. I started my apprenticeship in 2008 and it’s three-year apprenticeship – so 2008-2011. It’s basically indentured servitude.

I was with my master (Katsura Bunshi VI), no day off, for three years – cleaning his house, doing the laundry. You’re just with the master every waking hour for three years and you just watch and learn.

In 2011, I finished my apprenticeship so I’m in my 14th/15th year as a professional storyteller, which qualifies me as a master. I could take apprentices now, if I chose or if someone wanted to be my apprentice. So far, nobody’s come out of the woodwork!

JOHN: So, Luca, do you want to wash Sunshine’s laundry?

LUCA: I’m not comfortable with hair. I got rid of mine because I was tired of washing it.

SUNSHINE: (LAUGHING) He’s changing the subject!

Romanian musical comic Dragos aka Titus and a theory of universal comedy

I blogged about Dragoş Moştenescu almost exactly a year ago – around four weeks after he arrived in the UK from Romania.

In Romania, he was a TV star, appearing in his own hit TV sitcom La Bloc for seven years and more than 700 episodes.

This coming weekend, he will be starring in his almost two-hour show All Aboard! at the Leicester Square Theatre in London.

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JOHN: You have been in the UK for almost a year now…

DRAGOS: Yes. I came to London because – first – the language. And second because – no matter what your field of work – if your performance is good, then they will accept you here. Britain – especially London – is already a mix of cultures. I like it. I have decided to move here for good, with my wife and kids, maybe next year – my son and twin daughters – non-identical. One is blonde; one is brown-haired.

JOHN: The Leicester Square Theatre event on Saturday is a one-man show?

DRAGOS: Not quite. The Romanian comedian Radu Isac is opening for me… and Luca Cupani from Italy, who won the So You Think You’re Funny contest a couple of years ago.

JOHN: Why do you bill yourself as Titus and not Dragos?

DRAGOS: Titus is my middle name and I think, when British people see a poster, Titus is easier to pronounce and keep in mind and Dragos is more East European so I think is not so appropriate whether or not Brexit happens.

JOHN: I can’t think of any big-name Romanian musical comedians in Britain. So I guess that’s your Unique Selling Proposition.

TITUS: I would try to put being Romanian to one side. I doubt that being Romanian is a selling point.

JOHN: Well, it makes you stand out from the opposition.

TITUS: I am not really trying to compete with very well-known and very talented stand-up comedians in the UK. I do not do stand-up comedy. What I do is more of a one-man show where music is involved and live piano and non-verbal moments. Like a pantomime, more-or-less. Musical comedy and non-verbal.

JOHN: So your act can appeal to anyone…

Titus/Elton as you won’t be seeing him on Saturday – possibly

TITUS: Yes, this is why I keep everything on the stage to general topics – family, kids, money, iPhones or technical things which have taken over our lives lately. I speak about Count Dracula, who is an international icon.

JOHN: And you do some songs as Elton John, who is known internationally.

TITUS: I won’t be doing Elton John on Saturday. Well, maybe as an encore. But I am trying to show people how I can combine music and comedy more generally. If I am only known for doing Elton John, I will never make a name for myself properly. Elvis Presley impersonators only get known as Elvis Presley impersonators; people do not even remember the name of the performer.

JOHN: Your Leicester Square Theatre show is an attempt to get seen by influential people.

TITUS: Yes. My next step has to be to try to get an agent, which would ease things for me. You cannot thrive by yourself.

JOHN: I heard about one agent who said they would not represent a 26-year-old performer because she was too old. Agents tend to want young, inexperienced people so they can mould them and take credit for their success.

TITUS: Being older than 26 has its downsides and upsides. My 20 years of television and performance experience means I don’t need to build up my performance or act in the same way a 26 year-old has to.

JOHN: Do you own La Bloc, the Romanian TV sitcom?

TITUS: Yes. I was not only the producer and an actor in it, but I created it. I created it from a blank page to what it became. It ran daily Monday-Thursday for roughly seven months a year over seven years – over 700 episodes.

JOHN: That’s a lot of sevens and a lot of plot lines.

TITUS: Yes. I developed a team of about ten writers.

JOHN: Not seven?

TITUS: No.

JOHN: How does British comedy differ from Romanian comedy?

TITUS: What we do not have in the Balkans so intensely or so consistently is one-liners. Here in the UK there are a lot of one-liner comedians: punchline after punchline after punchline. Short jokes one after the other.

JOHN: At the Edinburgh Fringe, the successful shows in the last ten years or more have tended to be story-based. The comics have to fill an hour and that is very difficult with just gags, unless you are Jimmy Carr or Milton Jones or Tim Vine. 

TITUS: Yes. I went up to Edinburgh this year to see shows and there were several shows like this. They were doing a type of storytelling where you do not necessarily have to laugh every two or three minutes. They build you up a little bit, then there is a good section of laughs and they end with an idea.

JOHN: And they love a bit of autobiographical tragedy in comedy shows at the Fringe. There is the ‘dead dad’ moment…

TITUS: Dead dad moment?

JOHN: The audience tends to lose concentration after about 40 minutes, so you suddenly throw in some unexpected tragedy like your father died of cancer – it has to be true – and the audience is grabbed by the throat and pay attention again. Their emotions fall off a cliff and then you build them up again to an uplifting, happy ending.

Titus: “Comedy equals Truth plus Pain”

TITUS: Yes. Comedy equals Truth plus Pain.

JOHN: Truth plus Time?

TITUS: Truth plus Pain. What is Pain? It’s Truth and, if you can extract comedy from this, that is genuine, pristine comedy.

JOHN: I suppose the classic cliché comedy gag is someone slipping on a banana skin although, in the real world, that is not funny; it’s tragedy. So you are laughing at someone else’s troubles, from relief they are not yours.

TITUS: Exactly. In Henri Bergson’s book Laughter, he breaks the mechanism down to the basics and he explains how and why people laugh. He states there that punishment or accidents apply on human subjects and…

JOHN: I guess one reason why people laugh is the unexpected. A release of tension. Even if it is tragic, like slipping on a banana skin, they will laugh because it is unexpected. People laugh at one-liners for the same reason: because the punchline is unexpected.

TITUS: Yes, the book How To Be Funny Even If You’re Not is interesting. It mentions the Rule of Three.  

JOHN: And it does always tend to be better with three. Two or four don’t work. It’s all in the…

TITUS: …timing. 

JOHN: That is universal. But if, in Romania, there was no tradition of punchline-punchline-punchline comedy, what was.… In Italy, they had Commedia dell’arte… What was the tradition in Romania or the Balkans in general? Storytelling?

TITUS: More-or-less, yes. Monologues. Not necessarily told from your own perspective, which British and American stand-up routines are. In our monologues, you can talk about something that happened to another guy or it can be pure imagination and fiction.

JOHN: We had that sort of tradition in the Victorian and Edwardian music halls and in the 1930s – Stanley Holloway and others. There are storytelling nights cropping up in London now – Spark, Natural Born Storytellers and others. Have you seen any of those?

TITUS: No. But this is what I do in my show. A sort of storytelling. I come up with a kind of a theme, make a statement, a premise, build it up a little bit, then turn to music.

Edinburgh Fringe, Day 25: Comedy reviews, surrealism, nudity and politics

The Edinburgh Fringe splintered from the Edinburgh Festival 70 years ago and, like Christianity, has been splintering ever since.

The official International Festival and the official Fringe end on Monday; the Free Fringe ended today (Saturday); and the Free Festival and Bob Slayer’s Heroes venues close tomorrow (Sunday).

So today I saw shows for which mentions in this blog will, alas, not get any extra bums-on-seats. But, then, I think mentions in this blog only add to ‘profile’ not to bums. So apologies to them, but just think of the increasing prestige.

I always try not to ‘review’ shows or acts. I think I may have failed today. When I do this, it never ends well for me.

Cassie Atkinson (centre), a real character

I have a tendency not to like character comedy if the characters are too close to reality; I don’t mind more cartoon-caricature-like or wildly OTT character comedy. Which makes it odd that I like  Cassie Atkinson. I think it must be that the character comedy I hate is the stuff that feels like acting students doing an end-of term performance to their drama school mates. And I guess Cassie is a better actress than most! Or maybe she adds a tiny pinch of herself into even the characters least like her, so I buy into them more. I have no idea.

She does occasionally show a taste for the genuinely surreal – never a bad thing in my eyes though, alas, TV producers have no taste for the actual genuinely surreal. But now she seems to have linked up, more often than not in a blonde wig, with Kat Butterfield and Charlotte Pearson to perform sketches as Northern Power Blouse who, with luck, should be more attention-grabbing for TV producers – not that she really needs them with National Theatre work in her CV.

Lovely Lucy Hopkins – part light-fantastic

The genuinely lovely Lucy Hopkins is probably too good for British TV as her show Powerful Women Are About is said to be inspired by Mohammed Taleb’s Witches, Eco-Feminists, The Adventurers of the Soul of the World and is correctly described on the flyer as “part  electro-ritual, part theremin-experiment, part light-fantastic. Ultra-conscious comedy by award-winning, internationally-touring, terribly present clown.” In other words, it is totally un-categorisable – awkward for commissioners scared about the security of their jobs who think in terms of safe elevator pitches.

No great loss, though, as Lucy’s work is very specifically for live theatre.

Becky Brunning is interesting because she can bill herself as being an actor in the popular Broadchurch TV series – which will certainly help her in elevator pitches and may be why her room was literally full to overflowing with punters – some people couldn’t get in. Beaming is/was her debut solo show at the Fringe and, I have to say, was/is weird.

Becky Brunning suddenly pulled out a twist with a call-back

In Beaming, she establishes herself as a likeable, ordinary, modest girl-next-door then progresses to fairly standard, well-structured, low-key observational comedy – driving tests, shopping, crisps (I think she may have lost the audience on the long crisps section of the show) and she even, unless my ears had an audio hallucination, actually delivered the straight non-post-modernist line: “Does anybody in the room like food?”…

But then, in the last 10 minutes or so, she suddenly brings in a totally different and fascinating autobiographical strand about sexuality which would and perhaps should have been an entire show in itself. This strand did not come out of nowhere – it was a call-back to a tiny fact which had been mentioned in passing earlier in the show, but she suddenly pulled out a twist on this earlier comment.

Most of her show was standard and very general observational comedy. When she suddenly switched to very specific, unique personal stuff, something happened. I hate to say she is “one to watch” – far be it from me to be cliché. But I am certainly going to see her next show.

Luca Cupani even appeals to Hungarians

Then I went to see the wonderful Luca Cupani who, at the Malcolm Hardee Comedy Awards last night added to his glittering collection of awards the title Scottish National Russian Egg Roulette Champion 2017.

I thought I had seen his show – It’s Me! – at a preview in London, which is why I went to see it so late in its run here, but he has developed it beyond recognition and, of course, was superb. I can never quite get my head round why he is so good.

In theory, his Italian accent and what objectively is a rather dithery, broken-up delivery should interfere with the flow of the comedy but, for some reason – perhaps because it requires a slight bit of extra attention from the listener (but not too much), he is consistently fascinating. And he knows how to structure a story.

Interestingly, the room today contained Scottish, English, Siberian punters and a  lady sporting a T-shirt saying: I SPEAK HUNGARIAN. She was Hungarian. They all enjoyed it. I was watching the Hungarian lady a lot – her English was not too strong and she loved the show.

Becky backstage at Malcolm Hardee Awards

Next stop was Becky Fury, who had hosted the wildly chaotic Malcolm Hardee Comedy Awards Show last night. The chaos was not of her making – acts not turning up, acts turning up late, acts not saying in advance what they were going to do. And she handled it all masterfully, if that’s the right word, making up most of it on the spot – including swallowing a 3ft long balloon and doing a gameshow based on the health warnings on cigarette packets. Literally honking her breasts, of course, is always a crowd pleaser. And so it was tonight in her Molotov Cocktail show, ending with her successful rollercoaster of a Calais Jungle story. She dropped the political sections of the show and it still worked.

I am still waiting for the autobiographical street anarchist show which she has in her: if she ever does it, that will be a unique, perhaps literally fiery Fringe show.

If she does not get arrested.

Or even if she does.

A man conducts himself well

Rounding off the evening for me was a show called Brain Rinse – Puppetry of The Audience which threatened in its publicity to be “immersive” (almost always a horrifying idea).

In fact, it was superbly entertaining for the same reason that Herbie Treehead worked so well at last night’s Malcolm Hardee Comedy Awards Show. Both Herbie and Brain Rinse’s Mike Raffone (say it out loud) have long experience in street performance, so their audience control is second-to-none. A well-structured show; the ability to ad-lib on the hoof; top notch audience psychology. All hail!

That was my day.

Meanwhile, elsewhere…

Last night, at the repeatedly aforementioned Malcolm Hardee Comedy Awards, Russian Egg Roulette competitor Samantha Pressdee could not stop herself taking her top off. She has a lot of ‘previous’ in this.

Samantha Pressdee – a woman never knowingly overdressed

And, while I was roaming round the hot and sticky comedy rooms of Edinburgh today, she was out in the fresh air and I do mean ‘out’.

Apparently this was the 10th International ‘Go Topless’ Day and there was a rally in Edinburgh. The stated rules included:

NO-ONE IS IN CHARGE.

AS ALWAYS THE RALLY IS ESSENTIALLY ANARCHIC AS NO-ONE HAS AUTHORITY OVER ANOTHER PERSON’S BODY OR VOICE.

Samantha sent me a ‘report’ on what had happened:

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The annual Edinburgh Free The Nipple rally for International Go Topless Day and Women’s Equality Day has been a success.

Members of the public joined in with regular campaigners and an open mic was held as a platform to oppose the censorship of opinion as well as nipples.

Only one member of the public got offended, shouting at protesters: “Shame on you! You’re flaunting yourselves! I can’t bring my daughter in to this space!” 

I chased the lady whilst shimming my tits shouting: “Breasts feed children!”

The hysterical woman responded: “I know! My daughter has seen my tits loads of times!” before telling a photographer to “Fuck off!”

I wrote FREE LOVE on my chest in protest of the threatened extradition of alleged hacker Lauri Love.

He is appealing in the High Courts this November on the grounds that, because of his Aspergers and severe depression, he would be unable to cope in the US prison system and would commit suicide.

For more information see freelauri.com

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So there you are.

Comedy reviews, naked tits and political activism.

For what more could one ask?

Edinburgh Fringe, Day 24: The Malcolm Hardee Comedy Award winners 2017

The late, out-standing comic Malcolm Hardee.

The final increasingly prestigious Malcolm Hardee Comedy Awards Show took place in the ballroom of Edinburgh’s Counting House.

The winners chosen by the five judges earlier in the day, with awards presented by critic Kate Copstick and Malcolm’s sister Clare Hardee during the show, were:

MALCOLM HARDEE AWARD FOR COMIC ORIGINALITY
Terry Alderton for his successful self-reinvention and, well, for originality

MALCOLM HARDEE CUNNING STUNT AWARD
Mark Dean Quinn for his simple yet successful subversion of the star system of comedy reviews by putting other people’s quotes and stars on his own flyers.

THE ACT MOST LIKELY TO MAKE A MILLION QUID AWARD
Rob Kemp, currently performing in the Elvis Dead.

The Awards Show, compered by Molotov Cocktail street anarchist and comic Becky Fury, concluded with the increasingly prestigious annual Scottish Russian Egg Roulette Championship supervised by Andy Dunlop, President of the World Egg Throwing Federation and John Deptford, Vice President of the World Egg Throwing Federation.

Italian comic Luca Cupani is now officially the 2017 Scottish National Russian Egg Roulette Champion, having previously represented British comedy in Canada.

I have to add, with some humility, that I was also the recipient of a surprise prize for my work on the Malcolm Hardee Comedy Awards over the last ten years: 16 cans of Red Bull, bought by the three female members of the judging panel for supervisory services rendered.

Earlier in the day, World Egg Throwing President Andy Dunlop revealed to me that there has been a recent outbreak of exploding intestines across the UK.

“There is methane produced inside the human body,” former-fireman Andy explained, “and when you have surgery using laser scalpels, that is enough to ignite it and there have been a number of fatalities in operating theatres in which intestines exploded into the room.”

Vice President John Deptford, who (this is true) left for Peru four hours after the Awards Show finished, took 7 seconds of video footage of the two hour show.

Brevity can be a virtue.

Context is King.

The ballroom of The Counting House was left with some unfortunate egg stains, indelible memories and an inexplicable smell of paraffin.

You had to be there.

Edinburgh Fringe, Day 14: Sad comedy and Alex Salmond’s Comedy Award?

Luca Cupani makes a happy point at today’s Grouchy Club

At the Grouchy Club this afternoon, Kate Copstick got worried about the fact Italian comic Luca Cupani has a new girlfriend. Copstick is of the opinion that happiness is not a good ingredient for a comedian’s emotional make-up and that having children is worse. She lamented good, edgy comedians reduced to talking on-stage about their children’s cuteness.

I tend to agree. I remember Charles Aznavour being asked why all his songs seemed to be unhappy. Why did he never write songs about happiness? He said because, when people are happy, they are pretty-much happy in the same way. But, when people are unhappy, they are uniquely unhappy because of specific circumstances. So their stories are more interesting.

As with songs so, perhaps, with comedy.

Juliette Burton flies high in The Butterfly Effect

This afternoon, I saw Juliette Burton’s Butterfly Effect show in a totally fully room. She has sold out her last two Edinburgh Fringes, her recent Brighton Fringe shows and, so far, every one of her shows at the current Edinburgh Fringe. I know why. She makes audiences happy – and this show is about being kind to other people. The only criticism I have ever heard of her is that she is too Sally Sunshine happy. But, to get there, the actual meat of her shows is a string of madness, emotional turmoil and upset. What holds the happy-making shows together is actually the narrative glue of unhappiness.

Feelgood musical anecdotal autobiographical

Interestingly, tonight I also saw Shit I’m In Love With You Again. This is, in its effect on the audience, a feelgood musical anecdotal autobiographical show from Canadian Comedy Award winner Rachelle Elie. But, though feelgood and jolly, again the narrative goes through unhappiness to get to the comedy and the surprise ending, which may support Copstick’s point.

Meanwhile, as every year, from a slow start, people are now pulling cunning stunts in a desperate bid to win an increasingly prestigious Malcolm Hardee Cunning Stunt Award.

Nathan Cassidy (see yesterday’s blog) is now claiming the Best MC gong he awarded himself was a Malcolm Hardee Award (rather echoing Cally Beaton, who had already claiming an unconnected award she got last year was a Malcolm Hardee Award).

Man in a balaclava in a corner not saying anything

And, in today’s increasingly prestigious Grouchy Club, Sir Richard, one half of Bob Blackman’s Tray (the other half being genuine Malcolm Hardee Award winner Johnny Sorrow) sat in a corner and said nothing.

This evening, a webpage appeared, claiming he had been nominated for a new (fictional) award – The Malcolm Hardee Person Most Likely To Sit In The Corner And Not Say Anything Award – and got 5 stars from Scotsman critic and Malcolm Hardee judge Kate Copstick.

In fact, we do not fully discuss the nominees until noon next Monday.

I can exclusively reveal here, though, that one nominee for a Cunning Stunt Award may be Scotland’s former First Minister Alex Salmond – for hinting on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that he was going to tell a sadomasochism story involving Kirsty Walk on his Edinburgh Fringe chat show.

Edinburgh Fringe Day 4: a ferociously funny comic & a Fringe legend returns

Becky Rimmer was celebrating her Bat Mitzvah

Today, I saw the ferociously funny – and I do mean ferocious – Candy Gigi Present Becky Rimmer’s Bat Mitzvah!…

Then the incongruity of Pat Cahill expertly controlling a full room with a fishing rod and stories intermittently about being The Fisherman…

Other highlights were The Incredible Joz Norris Locks Himself Inside His Own Show, Then Escapes, Against All The Odds!!

The Fringe Office tried to ban him from using two exclamation marks in that title, but he claimed the second one was artistically vital and they backed down. In this show, his surreal creativity continues to inch towards the more personal material which I think may eventually break him Big, as our American cousins might say…

Over ten years in casinos and dry vegetables

I rounded off the evening with a large audience and a small dog listening to impressive storyteller Matthew Harrison explain what his show title Fuck Me Like Dry Vegetable has to do with his ten-year career in the UK casino business.

In fact, the censorious Fringe Office has insisted his show be called F*ck Me Like Dry Vegetable. That’s really disguising the word, good ’n’ proper!

With over 3,500 shows and around 50,000 performers in town during the Fringe, flyering to get audiences is vital and, very often it ends up with performers flyering other performers.

I bumped into Italian comic Luca Cupani at Fringe Central this morning.

Luca Cupani with the surprising flyer today

“I was flyering in the street,” he told me, “and there was this beautiful girl. She gave me her flyer and I gave her mine. I asked her: When is your show? She said: From seven to one. Which I did not understand but, when she left, I looked at her flyer and it took me a while to understand it was not normal. I thought she must be a very clever comedian telling jokes half-naked to challenge sexism. You know those kind of things they do. But no. Then I realised the truth.”

Highlight of my day, though, was to receive an email from 2007 Malcolm Hardee Comedy Award winner Doktor CocaColaMcDonalds. The last I heard of him, he had sold his canal boat in Nottingham or somewhere similar and disappeared off the face of the earth. His e-mail read:

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The great Doktor CocaColaMcDonalds

I am still alive. Just.

I have a sister.

Foolishly, she has decided to become a stand up comedian.

It will end in tears.

She is like me. but better.

She is playing at Edinburgh Fringe.

She is called Jeanette Bird-Bradley.

Her show is Context, People! at the Bourbon Bar, 5th-13th August.

Thank you for the good memories. I still treasure my Malcolm Hardee Award.

I hope the last decade has treated you well.

Your humble servant

dokctor cocacolamcdoanlds

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Kate Copstick’s chip price was an unPleasance surprise

I returned to the Edinburgh flat to find Copstick complaining. No surprise there.

She had had a small plate of chips at the Pleasance Courtyard at lunchtime which cost her almost 10p per chip. Par for the course in Edinburgh at Fringe time.

But not even that diminished the joy of hearing again from the great Doktor CocaColaMcDonalds…

Edinburgh’s Fringe and Montreal’s Just For Laughs: the same but very different

Luca Cupani was back in Edinburgh yesterday

Yesterday I chatted to Italian comedian Luca Cupani. He had just come back from representing the UK at Canada’s Just For Laughs festival in Montreal.

He – Italian comedian Luca Cupani – had been officially representing the UK along with Japanese comic Yuriko Kotani. Although he had not actually encountered Yuriko over there but had seen Danish comedian Sofie Hagen.

“Perhaps Danish comedian Sofie Hagen,” I suggested, “was representing the UK instead of Japanese comedian Yuriko Kotani.”

“That could be,” said Luca.

“How was Just For Laughs?” I asked.

“I feel like a nun who goes to an erotic fair who comes back to the nunnery with a bag full of dildoes and she doesn’t even know if they are dildoes. I realised only at the end how big it was.”

“Just For Laughs?” I asked.

“Yes,” said Luca.

“Just checking,” I said.

“I met this person,” continued Luca, “and these people and that person and they were approachable. I found out that the more important they are, the more easy they are to talk with because they are resolved: they are happy.”

“It was different from the Edinburgh Fringe?” I asked.

Luca’s current Confessions show at the Fringe

“Well,” said Luca, “the Fringe is all on the shoulders of the performers. You do your show and, among the punters, there might be some industry people. But the industry it is hidden; you don’t see them. In Montreal it is more visible – the industry. The companies, they promote the shows, they invite people and then the punters come. It is on the same level as Edinburgh but different.

“And they are Americans and Canadians, so the least experienced comedians there have maybe had sold-out tours across the USA. If you have a sold-out tour in the UK, you have maybe been to 10 or 12 cities. There, they have filled arenas across 40 or 50 cities. It gave me a sneak-peek into the real world and the fact there is a chance to make a living out of comedy.”

Luca’s current Fringe show is The Admin of Death and Other Confessions in the 40-seat BlundaBus.

Yesterday was a normal day for me in Edinburgh. It spat with rain occasionally and, in the streets, I bumped into perhaps 10-15 people I knew. Plus 3 people with whom I had longish conversations and whom I have clearly met in the past but I had no idea who they were. Not even after longish conversations. It is difficult to probe too deeply without asking outright: “Just who the hell exactly are you?”

I blame a combination of a lack of sleep and too much Red Bull.

Marny Godden, as Moses, met Japanese John

All I know clearly is that I saw Marny Godden’s multi-character-based show Where’s John’s Porridge Bowl? in which she starts dressed as Moses with beard, staff etc and riskily but successfully kept picking on three Japanese punters in the front row as audience participants despite the fact two had limited English. One of them went into such extended giggles at one point that Marny rightly just looked at her for around ten seconds. The main picked-upon Japanese was a triumph of unlikely audience-choice who joined-in enthusiastically while one of his chums videoed it on a smartphone.

Charlie Dinkin – with tales of headless snails and swastikas

Good punters also helped Charlie Dinkin’s show Can’t when one member of the audience volunteered that her mother enjoys killing snails by drowning them in beer then cutting their heads off. Charlie fought back with the real-life surreality of a night she spent with a member of the Bullingdon Club involving swastikas.

Who said 1960s-style events were dead?

Highlight of the day, though, was seeing Candy Gigi’s show If I Had a Rich Man.

Candy Gigi with carrots and a meaty comedy show

Last week, I booked her to sing on the Increasingly Prestigious Malcolm Hardee Comedy Awards Show on the final Friday of the Fringe – on the basis that, from previous shows I had seen, I knew she could sing and it would be unexpected.

When I first saw her perform a few years ago doing 10-minute spots involving hysteria and desperate vegetable-eating, I thought she was wonderfully original.

Once seen, forever remembered. But I did wonder how on earth she could develop the act beyond 10 minutes.

She proved me wrong when she did a half hour Fringe show two years ago, still based heavily around hysteria and vegetables but which was held together by force of personality. For that, she won the increasingly prestigious Malcolm Hardee Comedy Award for Comic Originality.

She is now back at the Fringe with an extraordinarily original full-length show which holds together and, indeed, has a climax. I can only describe it as a surprisingly dark and surreal autobiographical Jewish musical. Because, unknown in advance to me, this show turned out to be a part-belted-out-with-full-force comedy with blow-your-head-off songs. Whether her voice will last to the end of the Fringe, I don’t know.

Because of the singing and the occasionally quite dark mostly autobiographical narrative it is a different act, though vegetables do make a late and always-welcome appearance.

If I were a hack and desperate writer, I would say there is now comedy meat among her vegetables.

But I am, of course, not.

So I won’t.

The Edinburgh Fringe: where shows with no audience can get 4-star reviews

Multiple Red Bull usage – Not to be encouraged in Edinburgh

I arrived in Edinburgh for the Fringe on Monday morning at 7.55am and got into my rented flat at 3.15pm. Don’t ask. Just don’t ask.

I got very little sleep on the journey up, was mentally dead by the time I got into the flat and failed to rectify the matter with three Red Bulls. All they did was make me even sleepier. And the mental torpor did not abate yesterday, not even with – or possibly because of – three more Red Bulls.

I was already behind on six interesting blog chats which I had had last week and which I had been going to post in the days leading up to my arrival in Edinburgh.

For example…

Ivor feels a right tit; I have no caption shame.

I had a chat with long-time club organiser and comic Ivor Dembina about one of his three upcoming Edinburgh Fringe shows. (Yes, three this month.)

“On the last day before registration,” he told me, “an Edinburgh venue got in touch with me and said an act had pulled out so there was half a run free if I wanted it. So I said Yes I’ll fill it. I didn’t have a show, but they didn’t seem to mind.

“For the last two or three years, I’ve been running something I call a Comedy Drop-In – a fortnightly meeting point for anyone in comedy who just wants to get together and talk about what they’re doing and show some stuff. From complete newcomers who’ve never done a gig to seasoned club comics.”

“So it’s not like a six-week course?” I asked.

“That’s the thing,” said Ivor. “I don’t really set myself up as a teacher, more just a fund of information, as someone who’s been performing and running comedy on the circuit – fairly near the bottom of the food chain – for the best part of 30 years.”

“So that’s your show this year?” I asked.

“Sort of. I also noticed that, having done other courses and having been interviewed by the press, there is a fascination out there with the job of being a comedian. And, over the years, I’ve found myself being asked the same questions over and over again. So what I thought might be an idea for this year’s show would be me answering these questions in as interesting and entertaining and funny way as possible. When I started off, all I had was a title – I Should Have Listened to Ivor Dembina.

“One of the beauties of the idea was I could go on stage knowing I knew what I was talking about but not having to write a word. I’m also taking my show Old Jewish Jokes up to Edinburgh – the fourth year I’ve taken it up.”

“With new jokes?” I asked.

“No,” said Ivor. “The clue’s in the title. And I’m doing a third show this year – City Cafe: Late Nite & Free – a compilation show I’m compering.”

So Ivor Dembina is taking one of his shows – I Should Have Listened To Ivor Dembina – up to the Fringe by accident. And comedian Philip Simon is up here by accident too.

I accidentally met him on a train out of Elstree last week (we both live in Borehamwood).

Philip Simon with invisible Andy Zapp – on a Thameslink train

“Where are you going?” I asked.

“To an Equity Comedians’ Network meeting. We’re strengthening the industry through support of the union.”

“Oh yes?” I asked. “And what else have you been up to?”

“I got married last week.”

“To the woman you’ve been living with for two years?”

“It seemed easier.”

“You going up to the Fringe this year?”

“I’m doing a show with Aaron Levene: The GILF and The BuJew. But, in my case, The Guest and The BuJew. Aaron is really supposed to be performing it with Andy Zapp but, for the first ten days, Andy can’t be there.”

“What is on the flyers and posters?” I asked.

“My head on Andy Zapp’s body,” said Philip.

“With you Photoshopped in?” I asked.

“Yes,” said Philip. “With Andy Zapp’s everything, except his head. It’s even his wrist.”

Andy Zapp (left) and Philip Simon (right) with Aaron Levene thanks to the magic of Photoshop

“And, after that?” I asked.

“I’ll be in an Enterprise Car Rental commercial. I’m being a tourist. I get chased by a bull. They flew director Dawson Marshall Thurber over from America. He wrote and directed the movies Dodgeball and Central Intelligence.”

“Is the bull going to be added in on CGI?” I asked.

“No. It was real. We have already shot it.”

“You didn’t die?” I asked.

“I don’t think so.,” said Philip.

Italian Luca Cupani represents UK in Canada

I also had a chat with Italian comedian Luca Cupani who – in a double whammy of surreality – was about to go off to Canada to represent the UK at the Just For Laughs festival along with Japanese comedian Yuriko Kotani.

Unfortunately, I have taken so long not writing this blog that Luca is now back in the UK and his show – Luca Cupani: The Admin of Death and Other Confessions – starts tomorrow.

At the same comedy dementia show (yes it was) last week where I met Luca, I also had a chat with Steve Jameson aka excellent character act Sol Bernstein (who keeps reminding me I claim I don’t like character acts although I like his).

He remembered an Edinburgh Fringe gig which had been reviewed by Kate Copstick.

Steve Jameson as his character Sol Bernstein

“We knew Kate Copstick was coming,” he told me, “so we thought Ticket the place out! We gave away 30-40 tickets and nobody came on the night except Copstick and a guy from Mervyn Stutter’s show. So I did the show because I knew she wouldn’t come back. I called her a hooker, a lesbian; everything I say on stage to people in the audience. I called the poor guy from Mervyn Stutter a faggot – everything I could think of to insult him.”

At the end of the show, I got a standing ovation.

Copstick wrote in her review: He got a well-deserved standing ovation. She gave me 4 stars.

That epitomises the Edinburgh Fringe. Shows with no audience can get 4-star reviews if they are good. And some full-to-the-brim shows are shit.

In my opinion.

But what do I know?

Coprophilia: Kate Copstick in Kenya

Copstick with Jägermeister and cake last night

Last night was the first in a series of Grouchy Club events live in London.

I say ‘events’ because they are not really shows and not really meetings. They are chat shows in which the audience chat with comedy critic Kate Copstick and me about anything that comes into any of our heads.

The subject(s) is/are vaguely supposed to be about the comedy business, but the conversations can meander. Copstick and I have run the Grouchy Club at the Edinburgh Fringe for the last two years.

Italian comedian Giacinto Palmieri was there in London last night and, this morning, commented on Facebook:

“The Grouchy Club in London is even more shambolic than it was in Edinburgh… particularly the post-shamble shamble… I loved it.”

Arlene Greenhouse commented: “I had such a good, unadulterated, solid five minute walrus laughing session. I needed that. Thank you to the porn caster and eye roller. You know who you are!”

The post shamble shamble (L-R) Andrea Gordon, Luca Cupani, Giacinto Palmieri and Kate Copstick

There is a 12-minute audio extract from the two hour event/show/meeting online which includes a typically shambolic discussion about successful middle-class white comedians, Michael McIntyre, Mrs Brown’s Boys, Jimmy Logan, Italian comedy and Christopher Biggins.

Luca Cupani performed

The extract features the voices of Kate Copstick, Andrea Gordon, me, Arlene Greenhouse, Jo Palermo, Neil O’Rourke, Luca Cupani and Giacinto Palmieri.

Last night also included performances by 2015 So You Think You’re Funny? winner Luca Cupani and finalist Neil O’Rourke.

At the start of last night’s Grouchy Club, the subject of kittens’ bollocks was brought up – as mentioned in last Sunday’s blog.

Copstick explained more of the reality of her life in Kenya to the audience of Canadian/English/Irish/Italian/Scottish performers, which included Grouchy Club newcomer, actress Andrea Gordon.

---

COPSTICK
Living in my hovel…

JOHN
…in Nairobi

COPSTICK
…with hot and cold running rats, no toilet, the only good thing… Well, one of the only good things about using a bucket to shit in is that I just had explosive trots for about two of the weeks I was there. And, when I got back to Britain, there was the absolute joy of having a fart with no follow-through. Ooooh! My God! I was terrified to fart for two of the three weeks I was there.

I don’t know how many of you have experience of having really explosive trots, but y’know normally, when you’re pooing – generally speaking – when one thinks of pooing, one thinks of a… I was going to say… a downward motion.

Well, you think of a downward motion. But with the terrible trots, I don’t know if it’s just my arse but, especially when you’re sitting down, the pan contains it. But when you’re in a long-drop toilet and half standing-up, it’s everywhere. It’s unbelievable. It’s not even near where it’s supposed to go. It’s right up the back, on the sides, it’s down my legs, it’s absolutely everywhere. One of the good things about using a bucket to shit and pee into is that, once again, the horror of it all is contained within the plastic.

ANDREA
I’m just waiting to hear how this shit relates to the cat’s testicles.

JOHN
She needed to wipe her bottom, so she found a kitten.

COPSTICK
No. Apart from the termites, the hot and cold running rats, the people shooting immediately outside my door…

JOHN
It’s just like Glasgow isn’t it…

COPSTICK
…the one thing that made it almost fun was these two lovely little cats…

---

The remaining Grouchy Club events live in London are:

Tuesday 10th November
Tuesday 8th December
Tuesday 22nd December

Details on the Grouchy Club website.

Comedy critic Kate Copstick teaches me about beautiful male and feline genitalia

Copstick in Mama Biashara after the Grouchy Club Podcast

Yesterday afternoon, with Kate Copstick newly returned to London from Kenya, we recorded our weekly Grouchy Club Podcast.

Because there was a loud African band playing live in the performance space at the back of her Mama Biashara shop in Shepherd’s Bush. we went to a nearby cafe for the recording.

A man was sitting alone at the next table. This becomes relevant later on.

As normal, we did not discuss in advance what we might talk about. I just switched my iPhone on and started recording. Seven minutes into the 25 minute podcast, we had reached this point…

---

COPSTICK
I have to say…

JOHN
You don’t have to say… You don’t, you don’t.

COPSTICK
No, I do. I feel I have to say that…

JOHN
Hold yourself back for once.

COPSTICK
… I have never thought testicles… even the late, great and ever-increasingly prestigious Malcolm Hardee’s bollocks – They were extraordinary, but they weren’t beautiful – I’ve never seen a beautiful pair of human bollocks. I’ve seen a couple of very beautiful penises, but bollocks are not beautiful.

But my cat in Kenya. His little bollocks, they were beeauutiful!. Under his tail, obviously, there was the arse…

JOHN
Obviously.

COPSTICK
Then, under the arse, it was like a little heart-shaped pouch, a little heart-shaped furry pouch. And then, just under the little heart-shaped furry pouch, was another tiny little hole which I only noticed because, when I used to tickle his tummy, he used to get a tiny catty erection.

JOHN
Are we talking about a cat with two anuses here – two ani?

COPSTICK
No. It was just a little hole where his willy comes out. It retracts, John, when he’s not using it.

JOHN
He has a concave willy?

COPSTICK
No. There’s a little… It’s like… Oh, for God’s sake, I give up. Anyway, it was…

JOHN
I think you should continue the It’s like sentence.

COPSTICK
It was very cute.

JOHN
It’s like… Come on, I want you to carry on that sentence. It’s like…

COPSTICK
Well, men’s penises retract. Most animals’ penises retract almost totally. You’ve seen a horse. Even a horse, with its massive penis, it retracts for the sake of safety.

JOHN
It doesn’t retract. It shrinks.

COPSTICK
It retracts, also. It kind of gets hooked up. Fish. Most male animals. It gets almost totally sucked back up into the body with a little bit poking out. And my little cat has a little tiny, kind of…

JOHN
My Little Cat. There could be a toy range to be had here.

COPSTICK
…little glabial tissue.

JOHN
What’s a glabial tissue?

COPSTICK
Or glabular. What’s it called? Globulus? Glabrous? Glabrous. It means tissue with no hair. Like…

JOHN
Bald. There’s nothing wrong with being bald.

COPSTICK
Yes. Like, like, like… the tissue on your willy.

---

It was around this point that the man sitting alone at the next table in the cafe moved away with his cup to another seat. It was by the window. I guess he wanted to look out at the traffic driving past Shepherd’s Bush Green. We continued talking. The full podcast is HERE.

The West 12 Shopping Centre in Shepherd’s Bush, London

There will be a live Grouchy Club meeting/show this Tuesday at 6.30pm in the performance area at the back of the Mama Biashara shop in the West 12 Shopping Centre at the south east end of Shepherd’s Bush Green. Mama Biashara is in among the shops by the back end of Morrison’s supermarket. I mention this as the Mama Biashara website is down.

As with our Grouchy Club events at the Edinburgh Fringe, anyone can come. Entry is free.

Tuesday 13th October
Tuesday 10th November
Tuesday 8th December
Tuesday 22nd December

All at 6.30pm

These are not shows where the audience sits and watches. They are aimed at people in showbiz and the media who want to chat about the business and anything else that comes up. Or, as yesterday, talk bollocks. Anyone can come along. A real chat show meeting. A chance to interact with the doyenne of British comedy critics and some fat, slaphead comedy blogger. We are open to anything including occasional live comedy performances.

Luca Cupani (bottom left) at the SYTYF Awards in Edinburgh

This Tuesday Luca Cupani, winner of this year’s So You Think You’re Funny? award at the Edinburgh Fringe will be performing new material for his Fringe show next year. But it’s mainly chat between the audience, Copstick and me. 

Or Copstick just talking bollocks.