EVERYTHING MARKED WITH: 2 & 1/2 Stars


Martin Walker July 21st, 2014 by

We hope that Martin Walker will pull his finger out now that he’s editor of Broadway Baby. At ScotsGay last year it never seemed as if he took a punt on anything very much – most of what he saw was couched in terms such as “this is always good,” “brilliant as usual” etc. You […]


Ian Freeman July 17th, 2014 by

Ian Freeman is a reasonably competent reviewer who likes the jokes to come thick and fast. If they don’t, he’ll complain that the show flags, or that the gaps between gags are unsatisfyingly long, or even “filled with inane chat”. All of which is fair enough. He’s generous with his stars although not exactly gushing […]


Nanna Gunnars July 17th, 2014 by

Nanna Gunnars doesn’t want to be misunderstood. Perish the thought. Her reviews have  a fussy preciousness to them that’s as clumsy as it is amusing. Her description of Lost Voice Guy was both informative and reasonable, for example, concluding “His banter with the audience is one of the best I have witnessed, not just on […]


Sam Bradley July 17th, 2014 by

Sam Bradley commits some of the usual sins of the BB coterie, not least frequent slips of grammar and baggy prose. Of the Alternative Comedy Memorial Society he drones “…for the discerning comedy fans mulling over the current crop of comedians populating this year’s Fringe catalogue [continues ad infinitum]”. At one point Bradley forgets that he’s […]


Nadia Brooks July 17th, 2014 by

“A young lad with a winsome demeanour entered the room and high-fived everyone in the audience. Immediately I liked him.” Ugh, why do people write like this? Were they brought up by mongrels on a bombsite, living in an overturned wheelbarrow without pens or paper? I mean, WHY? It gets worse. “I for one liked […]


Mathew Tansini July 17th, 2014 by

Mathew Tansini writes as if he knows a lot about comedy. His convictions are such that, if you knew less about comedy than Tansini, you might well be taken in. But to know less than Tansini you would need to be from a place that doesn’t understand stand-up comedy, like Afghanistan or the Isle of […]


Keith Smith July 17th, 2014 by

Keith Smith writes like a Private Eye journalist writing a parody local news item: think Phil Space or Lunchtime O’Booze. The only thing lacking from his reviews is the signoff “Will this do?” and the response “You’re fired: Ed”. A man of action, Keith likes to start his sentences with a verb. Doing this is […]


Milly Reilly July 17th, 2014 by

There is nothing wrong with Milly Reilly’s reviews from a comedian’s point of view. She’s fair, she’s exacting; she goes through everything point by point. You won’t find her going all hatchety on anyone’s ass. There is, however, no real point getting a ticket to anything she reviews as she will have explained everything you […]


Roxane Hudon July 17th, 2014 by

Roxane Hudon isn’t a terrible reviewer, but she does possess some annoying tics that become more so as you read through her canon. By the end of it you feel you’ve pulled on a sandpaper vest. For one thing, Hudon seems tied up with her own preconceptions and determined to bore us with what they […]


Joe Walsh July 17th, 2014 by

I really cannot say anything about Joe Walsh that would sum him up better than his own sweet words. Take this: “It’s not important that a show hosted by Jo Caulfield is essentially starting at the bottom of a steep hill, as stimulating as her observational comedy and mundane audience interaction are.” So, you’re starting […]


Isobel Steer July 17th, 2014 by

Isobel Steer needs to decide what she likes; what she is passionate about in comedy, and then decide whether the things she is looking at match up to what she likes. At the moment she’s trying too hard to cover all bases and is watching comedy with a detached disengagement that doesn’t quite work. Thus, […]


Hilary Wardle July 17th, 2014 by

If you’re going to give someone a two-star review, Hilary, have some mercy: do it quick and do it clean. A 500-word dissertation on everything that happened in a show, along with what was wrong with it, seasoned with innumerable little jokes of your own, is inexcusable. It’s the reviewing equivalent of the axeman who […]


Faith Ashleigh-Wong July 17th, 2014 by

Reading Faith Ashleigh-Wong’s reviews reminded this Panda of a writing style a world away from Fringe buffoonery. In short, Ashleigh-Wong writes like a restaurant reviewer. And not a shitty modern restaurant reviewer of the Giles Coren talk-about-anything-but-the-food type. No. This is like the restaurant reviews you get in the Telegraph, or Conde Nast. Check out […]


Eleanor Lang July 15th, 2014 by

Purely in the interest of dotting the i and crossing the t of this collection of reviewer reviews, I present, joylessly, my review of Eleanor Lang. I really shouldn’t have to bother, because Lang only reviewed one piece of comedy in 2013, preferring to review theatre and ‘physical’, whatever the hell ‘physical’ is. Also, she performed […]


Callum Madge July 15th, 2014 by

Although I can only find one comedy review by Callum Madge in 2013, he does seem to write a lot of stuff elsewhere, some of it for a website called TV Bomb which “reports back from stage and screen with scathing clarity to help students decide how best to spend their loans.” On books, for […]


Yasmin Ali July 13th, 2014 by

Yasmin Ali only reviewed four shows at the 2013 Fringe, which made me wonder whether she’s that committed. Her writing skills, while not terrible, are not on a par with most of her peers at The Skinny, so perhaps she’s merely dipping a toe. If she wants to improve, Ali would do well to avoid […]


Help us pay the billsCLICK ON THESE F*CK*NG ADVERTS