edinburgh
The winner of the BBC Introducing Radio 4 Comedy Award Final has been revealed in the BBC Tent and at the Edinburgh Fringe.
Mark Watson (pictured) compered the final which featured Janine Harouni, Hannah Platt, Josh Jones, Donald Alexander and Mo Omar.
Previous finalists include Lee Mack and Peter Kay. Last year's winner was Glaswegian stand-up Stephen Buchanan.
And the winner this year, following in the footsteps of previous winners Rhod Gilbert, Lucy Beaumont and Alan Carr, is Janine Harouni.
Phoebe Robinson is a name very much on the rise in America. As half of the podcast 2 Dope Queens her candid, full-on brand of humour has won millions of fans and it has just been announced that she is to get her own chat show on Comedy Central. She probably doesn't need to make her UK debut at the Edinburgh Fringe to give her profile a boost.
Comedy duo Max Olesker and Ivan Gonzalez have become Edinburgh Fringe legends over the years with consistently inventive shows. Their styles can vary from the personal to the fictional and this year they've opted for a show that's very personal. And very funny too.
Last year the Edinburgh Comedy Awards Best Show shortlist consisted of seven shows. It was pretty clear early on that the ultimate winner Rose Matafeo was one of the front runners. I've been at this year's Edinburgh Fringe for well over a week now, spending most of my days (and nights) in dark sweaty rooms hunting out the best shows on offer. I would say straight away that the standard has been incredibly high. Attendances have seemed pretty good too to me. I'd say I've only seen one real dud and I certainly won't name that here.
A few years ago Milo Edwards made the news when it was reported that this Cambridge graduate had become an unlikely stand-up star in Russia. In Pindos – an all-purpose Russian word for American which now tends to mean "foreigner" – he tells the story of his flirtation with Soviet superstardom and how it is not what it is cracked up to be.
New sponsor, new comedy! Digital TV channel Dave is sponsoring the Edinburgh Comedy Awards for the first time this year. So they, as well as the rest of us hungry humour vampires, must be on the look out for new comedy blood.
Last year Ciarán Dowd from sketch group Beasts broke out with his acclaimed solo show Don Rodolfo, which won the Edinburgh Comedy Award for Best Newcomer. Could it be the turn of fellow Beast James McNicholas this year, who steps into the solo ring with The Boxer, which, like Don Rodolfo, is directed by comic Tom Parry?
With her camouflage designer frock, her fuck off boots and her pink tipped hair Samantha Pressdee looks every inch the urban warrior.
And she genuinely puts herself on the frontline – having joined the anarchist squatters protesting against social cleansing at the Sweets Way estate in North London.
It’s normally a very bad idea to try and make the art of acting the central topic of a Fringe show. But Garry Starr is the exception that proves the rule.
Starr is a character in love with the smell of the greasepaint, the glow of the floodlights and the roar of the crowd.
In his previous show Starr undertook to demonstrate every kind of theatrical style.
It’s hard to stay away from Edinburgh whether you are new to the comedy game or an old hand. This year there are a number of brilliant comedians coming back who have won the Edinburgh Comedy Award, best known as the Perrier but now sponsored by digital channel Dave. You can only win the top award once and there are certainly easier ways to make money, so why come back? It must be for the sheer fun and the incredible buzz of the Fringe.
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