‘Yes, it’s a groaner but I’m not ashamed it tickled me’
SHARON LOUGHER FINDS SOME UNMISSABLE ACTS (AND SOME TERRIBLE JOKES) AT THIS YEAR’S EDINBURGH FRINGE
THIS is how topsy-turvy my pandemic Fringe has become. The show I secretly want to see most this finale weekend is... whisper it... No More Jockeys. This is the stage version of a show that was conceived because of, became a hit during, and probably actually works best in: lockdown. Welcome back, live comedy. Um…
For the uninitiated, No More Jockeys is a game that stopped Taskmaster Alex Horne and his pals Tim Key and Mark Watson going lockdown loopy at the height of the shut-in. Does that triumvirate of names spark weird and wonderful memories?
Then you probably remember We Need Answers, their rather more ambitious gameshow from a few Fringes back where the audience had to text in questions under such categories as ‘Burning Issues and Fiddly Questions’ and there were
‘This is my plea to the Monkey Barrel, Alex Horne and co – Yes More Jockeys!’
points for getting things ‘quite right’.
Goodness knows what the rules were… but I do recall a daft running gag that saw Tim rolling along a makeshift track on an office chair and laughing myself silly at the jolting, juddering pointlessness of it all. This might have been the same year that Tim ended his solo show sitting on top of a fridge freezer. This absurdist king of white goods/office furniture probably never dreamed back then he’d have to spend so much time locked up with it.
So, to get back on point. The rules to No More Jockeys? All you have to do is name any celebrity, then state an exclusion related to that celeb for the next player, before they name another one. So you might say: ‘Jack Grealish… no more footballers’, etc etc. And so it goes on, until someone gets stumped, flouts the rules or there’s a blazing row.
The venue that has hosted their mayhem thus far, Fringe heroes the Monkey Barrel, have told me to keep an eye on their social media for additional shows. Nothing as yet. So this is my plea to the Barrel, Horne and co... Yes, More Jockeys!
Who else is on my hit list this weekend? Alex Kealy, because I rather fancy a sharp, political, soul-searching self-deprecator of the James Acaster mould in my life. His is a show tackling connection – as well as ‘Silicon Valley, advertising, addiction and monopolies’ – following a time when we needed it the most, and will be unleashed at the Monkey Barrel (where you pay in advance) and the Counting House (where you pay what you can). His is a busy old work rate, but he’s sure to garner a bunch of new fans after the last Fringe raindrop falls. Then there’s the seriously clever and worldly-wise Ivo Graham, who was born in Tokyo, raised in the UK, read French and Russian at Oxford and makes jokes like: ‘Do I enjoy randomly appointing people to judicial positions? I’ll let you be the judge of that.’ Yes, it’s a groaner. No, I’m not ashamed that it tickled me. Though his Hyper Reality (at the Pleasance’s Rear Courtyard) promises more expansive tales of domestic drudgery, too. This year I’ll also be seeing more TV stars than usual warming up for their tours, as the Covid fall-out is unique for each person – and will have derailed even the most established names.
Scratching their comedy itch (and mine) is ‘ray of sunshine’ Jack Dee, who’ll be bringing the deadpan to Assembly George Square Gardens; the genial and deceptively spiky Dara Ó Briain (performing So Where Were We? at the Pleasance Cabaret Bar); and the effortlessly brilliant Andrew Maxwell, who can make the biggest venue feel like a thrillingly intimate basement confessional. ‘As of tomorrow, I shall return to where every clown worth their salt should be in August,’ he posted on Twitter this week, alongside a pic of him lying arms folded atop Arthur’s Seat.
The Irishman has been performing stand-up since he was a teenager and for him the Fringe and all its mad antics is a drug, but don’t be fooled by his larky mischief. He’s also one of the most measured political comics around, as he’s proven from his dispatches on local Brexit debates (he now lives in Kent) in recent years. Expect a dose of Reality at his Corn Exchange shows – and probably some fond memories of his old pal Sean Lock, too.
Meanwhile, two UK-based Japanese performers will be
injecting me with more left-field perspectives. On Saturday there’s a one-off work in progress show from London-based Yuriko Kotani, who charmed the 2019 Fringe with her debut Somosomo and will no doubt love stretching her comedy legs at the friendly Pleasance Cabaret bar as she shares endearing lockdown stories and Disney movie obsessions in her second language.
Then there’s the much-talked-about new show from Edinburgh-based Mamoru Iriguchi, who trained as a zoologist in Kyoto before spreading his wings and becoming an acclaimed theatre-maker. He’s holding court at the Summerhall space with Sex Education Xplorers (S.E.X.), a funny and fearless, time-travelling comedy spelling out all the things they didn’t tell you in sex education at school. Its thoughtful take on gender and the transgender debate also makes it bang on the zeitgeist.
And last but not least comes some sillier international flavour from ‘German comedy ambassador’ Henning Wehn, who’ll be cheering up the Corn Exchange with It’ll All Come Out In The Wash, and is on my must-see list as I’ve not seen him since Brexit actually happened. Which means, from Euro trashing and football to shambolic vaccine roll-outs, he’ll have a butter mountain of material. As zee Germans would say… prost!