Daniel Sloss is getting more and more attention and has recently been seen on Michael McEntire’s Comedy Roadshow. This guy is going to be huge!

One of the things that comics do when they are about to come on stage, you may have seen it on the BBC, is have music playing before and as they enter the stage.  Here I am sat ready to laugh and was Daniel had Iglu and Hartly seminal hit ‘In this City’ playing (for those of you know want to know we interview them awhile ago) so I had in my heart great feelings about this show.

This was one of the shows I was really looking forward to because I was told it was going to be great, and tonight’s show was a sellout.  Daniel has had a great deal of attention lately and even has a big spread in one of the many fringe guides which didn’t lie.  His confidence on stage was something you wouldn’t expect from a 18 year old and his material was punctuated with some very good insights into what it’s like to be a teenager.

Daniel admits that he is limited in what he can can do as he’s only 18, and he looks it.  But he still has a lot to talk about and using the clear differences in the age of him and the other comics, growing up in Fife, and his family formed the main part of his show.  He does something a little off though.  He punctuates his show with some great bits and randomly slipped in jokes and references with such a class very few of his fellow (older) comics would have been able to make it seem as effortless as it was.

He also is able to dispel some of the myths of being a teenager as his set is well researched and he is able to draw from a well stocked bag of ideas and jokes.  Sloss clearly has ideas in his head and ways of looking at the world and his part in it.  There was very little swearing and his final bit about their airport came from nowhere.  When a comic says ‘do this its so funny’ you know the jokes going to bomb, but what he did was unique and one of the funniest things I’ve seen, and his bit about signing on is inspired!

His final bit before the close of his show will be something that will (or rather should) go down in Fringe history as one of the smartest and well thoughtout pieces of any comedy show, I will never see shaving in the same way again.

Daniel is heading for good things, he’s given up uni and this is his life.  He does come across very cute and wide-eyed and you this works for him.  There where a few bits where he lost his thread but was able to work it out and get back on track.  One of his best feature in the future is going to be working with the audience the few times he did it here where pretty sweet offerings from what was a wonderful show and a great act to watch.

‘In terms of what Daniel Sloss will offer you is a fresh slant on stand up…this guy is going to be big’*****Five Stars

One of the best things about The Fringe is that they never turn away anyone who wants to put on a show and for student productions this means they get to bring a show to the worlds biggest arts festival.  We have been lucky to have been introduced to Oxford University’s Drama Society and their production of “Round and Round the Garden” from The Norman Conquests.  This is what they had to say pre-Fringe.

When we where told that we were going to be coming to The Fringe we frantically tried to get as much information about student shows because we are bias I guess.  After some great help from Oxford Union we got the details of all of the shows that were heading to The Fringe from Oxford and we have been taken a little aback at the level of professionalism and passion that each of these productions have.

I have been lucky to have been able to exchange an email or two with Griffith Rees the Diroctor of Round and Round the Garden, being performed by Oxford University’s Lincoln Players and they have chosen a play that will only illustrate to all who see it how serious they are to their craft.

The Norman Conquests is a trilogy of plays written in 1973 by Alan Ayckbourn. The small scale of the drama is typical of Ayckbourn. There are only six characters, namely Norman, his wife Ruth, her brother Reg and his wife Sarah, Ruth’s sister Annie, and Tom, Annie’s next-door-neighbour. The plays are at times wildly comic, and at times poignant in their portrayals of the relationships between six more or less unhappy characters.

Our story (from my perspective):

Olivia (playing Sarah) and her friend Sophie wanted to take the Norman Conquests to the fringe, and enlisted Sam (playing Norman) in their quest to find a venue. After much hunting, the SpaceUK agreed to do a week run. Olivia put a call out for auditions and went looking for money while Sophie agreed to direct. Their college, Lincoln, granted her 2.5k and soon they had a nearly full cast and accommodation for the week.

However, Sophie was offered an internship and decided to drop out. Olivia put another call out for directors and I (griff) decided to apply. I grilled her for about an hour on funding, organization and tentatively agreed subject to seeing the cast. The initial read through went well but within a week we lost our ruth and had to hold
further auditions finally settling on Flo. I also switched the boys around on parts (twice!) before things really started to gel. Things also got a bit awkward when exams took over, but by the time everyone was done we had a great solid final week of rehearsing in Mansfield College Chapel, with excellent run-throughs over the last few days in their garden.

Rehearsing finished the first week of July, as Jenny (playing annie) went off to China and Olivia went to a drama course at Guildhall, while Sam went to Austria and Flo to Greece. I found Yasmin to take over marketing while I was stuck in oxford working on my phd. Then I went to a workshop in Italy with a terrible internet connection.

I frantically corresponded with Flo’s mother, a professional designer who graciously did our beautiful poster, and Laura our production manager while writing the code for our website and trying to learn something . I eventually went to an internet cafe to call my friend Rose to ask her to take over producing and she agreed. Poster got done, I came back and finished the website, Laura found most of the stuff we needed and we got a budget together to handle the rest.

It’s now 2 weeks to our opening night and I’m terrified. Just this past weekend I discovered we already sold out our initial allotment of online presales (15 per night). After giddily jumping around my flat and asking the venue to confirm this wasn’t some glitch, we allocated that money towards some more marketing and (thankfully!) a lot more plants for our set (it is a garden after all). I finally got the fringe website to increase our numbers, and I’m currently sorting out costumes remotely (having the cast try things on and sending me
pictures).

On the 17th (my birthday!) we’ll arrive at Olivia’s house for an intense final week of rehearsals and then bundle ourselves and our set onto a train bound for Edinburgh.

The Cast:

Olivia Charlton-Jones (Sarah) first year Spanish and Portuguese student; the production was her idea and she got us our money, venue, and accommodation.

Sam Buchdahl (Norman) first year History student; Olivia’s friend, helped her hunt for a venue and managed to get us a bit more money from the Lincoln College JCR

Jenny Ross (Annie) 3rd year french student; helped organize rehearsals and transport while Olivia had exams

Jack Blackburn (Reg) 1st year philosophy and theology: also helped organize rehearsals and props during exams (while directing a play of his own)

Emile Halpin (Tom) 1st year french: got us rehearsal space in New College garden in a pinch and juggled a very difficult exam schedule, tutors breathing down his neck trying to ban him from drama, and another play.

Florence Oakley (Ruth) 1st year Maths: got us her college chapel and garden for our last week of rehearsals and final run-throughs. Also convinced her mother to design our lovely poster.

or to give it the full flyer poster… ‘the survial of (r)evolutionary theories in the face of scientific and ecclesiastical objections: Being a musical comedy about Charles Darwin (1809-1882).

Few plays come to the fringe that stand out like ‘The Origins of Species’ and see’s John Hinton take on the whole that is Charles Darwin in this wild and wonderful ride through the life and times of one of the most famous scientist of our time.  As we walk thought the makeshift stage we are greated by Mr Charles Darwin sitting behind his desk trying to finish his notes.

John brings to life Darwin in a way you would never have thought.  His perfomance is simply wonderful to watch with the right balance of comedy, history, and music.   The play sheds some light on the man who has become one of the most important scientist in the 20th century and John takes us on the journey Darwin would have taken himself, the voyage on the Beagle, the people he met and who inspired his life, and his family.

This becomes more than an interesting play it becomes a very novel way of getting to know a Great Britain.  And all you have to do is add John’s warm nature and wild sense of humour and you have one of the sweetest shows at the Fringe 2009.  This was a sell out crowd and we where packed in to this make-shift studio but that didn’t matter.  The audience was fully into the show and the humour was so typically wonderous there where few moments you wouldn’t be either smiling or laughing really loud.

John’s songs where very much in his style incredibly creative and give you the journey you need to keep up with the story.  And there is one bit that is simply divine.

‘If your interested in history, music, and Charles Darwin then this is the show for you…but if your interested in music, seeing an original production, and one incredibly talented actor & singer then go and see this production before the fringe is out.’ *****Five Stars

There are some sketch shows that get put on and some of them like ‘Misery Eats Company’ that are amazing to watch and sets that bar pretty high.  And then there is The Gadabouts - Joe Bor and Matt Rudge - a sketch show that genuinely does stand out as one hell of a ride.

The sketch show formate has become one of he fringe 2009 biggest revivals and is something of an institution in the UK.  But unlike some of the lesser than funny offering that ITV has produced lately these sketch shows have lifted the lid on how well they can be put on.  It is also one of the hardest forms of comedy to put on because you have to maintain the audiences attention through costume changes, bad jokes, and most important of all believable character.

Some of the sketch shows have only managed half way and have not been able to see it all the way through.  Their character creation has been weak, or their sketch endings have been sloppy.  But Bor and Rudge seem to have hit the nail on the head with their show and work their scenes with comedy presision I have never seen.

Some of their characters: the life guard, the tour guide, T.a.t.u, driving instructed, to name but are few are genuine perfection.  But the guys had an ace up their sleaves which had not been seen by any of the other sketch shows.  To breakdown the flow of the show so that it wasn’t just them on stage all the time they used video’s and films that they had made.

But it was Bor’s ‘French Free Runner’ character video clip that blew me away and nothing prepared us for this character and the video was pulled off in true form of a comedy great clip.

They both seemed to really get on and had a great deal of fun on stage.  Matt sang, or tried to, a few songs and had this rather cute way of looking hurt and annoyed at Joe (a costumes reference).  The skill in being able to pull off each of these characters was a credit to their writing.  These two aspects made the show stand out with some of the jokes so odd and wonderful me and a whole bunch of other people left the room laughing and then some. And though there are loads of very good sketch shows at the Fringe these guys have given it a new lease of life, they have maintained the tradition of Sketch Comedy but have tweaked it enough and made it fresh.

‘The Gadabouts have made a convert out of me…long live the sketch show…some of the best characters and writing at the Fringe 2009′. **** Four Stars