Glasgow International Comedy Festival: Our Top Picks
By: Natalie O'Donoghue Jan. 29, 2019
As much as I enjoy the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, when it comes to stand-up my heart belongs to Glasgow International Comedy Festival. It's a lot like the Fringe, except I don't spend an entire month feeling completely exhausted and raging at Scotrail.
This year the programme seems bigger and better than ever and picking just ten shows was a challenge. The full line-up is available on the Glasgow International Comedy Festival website.
While most tend to bring last year's Edinburgh show to the Glasgow Comedy Festival, Ashley Storrie is debuting her new hour. Ashley's 2018 show Adulting was quite possibly my favourite comedy show of the Fringe so Hysterical is definitely top of my list for March!
Jonny Donahoe- Inheritance
Co-creator of Every Brilliant Thing Jonny Donahoe has recently become a dad and his show Inheritance is about having parents and learning to be a parent. Jonny is also doing a show at the same venue with Jonny and the Baptists which is razor-sharp musical political comedy.
Jay Lafferty is a regular on the Glasgow comedy circuit but I still haven't managed to catch her full hour due to poor planning on my part. I'm looking forward to rectifying this in March as one of the BWW team gave Wheesht a glowing review at the Fringe and it was shortlisted for best comedy show in the BroadwayWorld Edinburgh Awards.
Without doubt one of the filthiest comedians I have ever had the pleasure to see, Scott Agnew is presenting a show that is a collection of his favourite filthy stories over the last twenty years. Scott also has a work in progress at the festival and is running his afternoon blether twice during the month.
Tiff Stevenson is bringing a show which features some of her best bits from previous shows alongside new material before it heads to Edinburgh in August. I saw Tiff record an episode of Breaking The News in Glasgow last year and have been desperate to see a full hour from her since.
I saw Bampot last year at The Stand as part of their Edinburgh previews and totally fell in love with it. Nominated for the Edinburgh Comedy Award, featured on Live At The Apollo, Comedy Central and Michael MacIntyre's Big Show- you're going to want to catch him at the beautiful King's Theatre before he's selling out arenas.
Going to see live comedy is one of my greatest joys in life and just before Christmas, I was thrilled to be able to take my 7-year-old pal along to his first show The Stand for one of the kids shows. The particular standout performance for us was Mr Fibbers and he's been begging to see him again ever since. His expertly crafted comedy songs are clever, hilarious and will stick in your head for weeks.
Immaculate is another of my favourite Edinburgh shows from 2018. Catherine is the bisexual, OCD daughter of an Irish Catholic Deacon and she's got a hell of a lot to say about it. Since the festival, she's been seen on The Mash Report and Comedy Central's Roast Battle. As she's back in Glasgow in May with a new work in progress show, I imagine this might be the last chance to catch her debut hour.
Host of the Made of Human podcast, co-host of the Secret Dinosaur Cult podcast and soon to be published author of Happy Fat is bringing a work-in-progress of her new Edinburgh show to the Glasgow Comedy Festival. The show blurb promises "chickens, sex holidays, the Queen and grandmothers with violent tendencies".
The Taming Of The Shrew- Tron Theatre
Turning Shakespeare's original upside down, Jo Clifford's razor-sharp new version of The Taming of the Shrew invites us to imagine a world in which women hold the power. Get ready for a bawdy and riotous take on a contentious classic.
The Glasgow International Comedy Festival runs from 14th-31st March 2019 in venues all across the city.
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