The Edinburgh Fringe is upon us with a roar – the Mumble’s Damo had a wee scout out to see what was happening up toon
2024! The Year of the Dragon! The Fringe is here! Having decided in my infinite unwisdom to have a pop at doing a full month of comedy (Damo Brogden’s Comedy Trilogy, Uno Mas Keller, 15:30), I thought I’d have a little wander into town to check out the comedy zeitgeist, & maybe osmosisly absorb some materielle.
The first on the streets feel the truth in their bones, & walking into town about 8.30PM I had a reyt play-list on – I was proper bouncing. Then, taking stock a moment by the Just The Tonic cobbles off the Cowgate, I dash’d off the following sonnet.
Tis night & the streets of Edinburgh shine
From varying scintillant lights – but more!
For souls are lamps in the restless, divine
Festival time by the Forth’s busy shore –
Actors, comedians, hearts which produce,
Daytrippers flipping cool coins at the shows
Buskers & beggars, the global let loose,
Drugging reviewers with icebergs of prose
Aspin in deep oceans, that in August heat
Melt into sleep memory come the month’s end
I sit on a stone at the side of the street
In a daze at the ways of the praise & pretend
That is the colossus, the Fringe, whose affairs
But a magical montage of musical chairs!
Deffo on it this year, like – dragon years are always fun for a Fire Dragon.
The first show I wander’d into, by open-door chance, was downstairs at the Mash House, an interesting hour of Irish comedy led by the bass-line bouncy, champagne-fizzy Ally Ryan, & concluded by Becky Cheatle. Doing something physically proactive about her gender dysphoria at the age of fifty, Becky become a woman at 50, was right into Star Wars as a kid, but overall wasn’t amazingly funny. A curious hour that, like.
I next went to meet the whirling dervish of a comedian that follows my Damo Brogden show at the Keller, Corr Cohen, an American comedienne who somehow managed to tell me 8 stories at the same time, like paparazzi bulbs flashing in my face. Completely captivating! Her show, Ignorant American, blurbs;
Political satirist & stand-up, Coor Cohen, brings their one-woman show “Ignorant American” this Fringe season. Born in the North and raised in poverty in the South, she has spent 15 years connecting the common threads of the peoples of America while using their signature style to take swings at the governments both home and abroad.
I met her outside Starbucks on the Royal Mile, & we soon were trundling back to Just the Tonic land, where her American pals were hosting the second sold-out show in a row, the gimmicky ‘Wrong! A F*cked Up Game Show,’ whose blurb reads;
50% game show, 50% comedy show, 100% f*cked up! A celebration of dark humor, cancellable offenses, and questionable decisions that takes everything you know about game shows and turns it on its head.
After getting the audience members to tough it with a ‘worst week’ competition (see above), three of the world’s funniest comics go head-to-head-to-head to see who can earn the most made-up points, win the most prizes that we’ve rescued from the trash and ultimately be crowned the World’s Wrongest Comedian! Play your cards right, and you might win a prize from the audience! Hosted by Jay Light (Comedy Central, HBO).
I felt pretty welcome standing at the back with a guy from L.A. call’d Tyler (who seem’d to be the mastermind of events) & three supple & silvery comedians, who would get up on stage to sharetheir most fucked-up material in order win the night’s accolade.
Among the comedians were Kyle Ayers with his brain surgery stuff, drawing the deepest, edgiest laughs; & also Yola Lu, recently divorced from her ‘Wisconsin White’ husband, & has brought a show to Edinburgh call’d My Vagina is Trying to Kill Me.
I then said goodnight to the firecracker that is Corr – I’ll be seeing her every day for month, & she’s my brand new pal. Then, slipping on my headphones, on came Stakka Bo’s ‘Here We Go Again’ an incredibly apt song for the start of the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, 2024!
Damo
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