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The Book Club

Verdict: Packed with random fun
Edinburgh 06 - The Book Club - Underbelly - 6-27 August 06 - 16:25 (1:00)



The Dirty Book Club

Verdict: Not up to promise
Edinburgh 06 - The Dirty Book Club - Underbelly - August 06 - 23:50 (2:20)



www.myspace.com/bookclublive



THE BOOK CLUB

Host Robin Ince's The Book Club is a medley of acts, books, jokes - and a fair degree of serendipity. Not everything that happens is much to do with books, but it's all good fun.

There's an afternoon and late-night version of the show. Even in the non-dirty version, Robin Ince read extracts from How to Pick Up Sexy Girls. It's one of the world's few pulling manuals that includes graphs.

There's a table full of books. Some don't get read, but the titles are enough for a quick laugh. There's What God Does When Women Pray, Richard Littlejohn's To Hell In A Handcart, Mills & Boon's Rash Intruder (as opposed to a thoughtful one).

Ladies may want more of How To Marry The Man Of Your Choice. Sadly there's only time for: 'Skirts should be short - but within the normal range for where you live'.

Robin Ince reads random pages of Danielle Steel's poetry - with Martin White on accordion, and Asher Treleven's interpretive dance. Johnny Candon performs Gnarls Barkley performing various acts to Crazy; there's an extract from Cliff Richard's autobiography. Toby Hadoke out-geeks all with arcane Doctor Who knowledge, and reads from Grange Hill's Michael Sheard's name-dropping autobiography Yes Mr Bronson.

Eddie Newcomer Winner Josie Long, a regular on the show, does book gags that are mostly too obscure for this audience, but told well - they get laughs out of the obscurity.

With another turn from Asher Treleven and pop accordionist Martin White, the show could feel short of Robin Ince - its named star - but instead it feels packed with random fun.

*** *** ***


THE DIRTY BOOK CLUB

The Dirty Book Club has a late-night slot (see The Book Club (above) for the afternoon version). Tonight Josie Long says that host Robin Ince has gone to an interview. She starts by pretending to be like him, but her stage personality quickly bubbles through, and she's soon reading the books in rather more thrilled tones than the absent host's - oddly, it works just as well. How To Marry The Man Of Your Choice has her practising dating questions on a man in the audience.

Martin White whizzes through Teenage Kicks on the accordion - with a brief guitar solo, then a German version. Then it's Johnny Candon. Bridget Christie does Dan Brown telling an extraordinarily extended chicken-crossing-the-road gag, followed by a mother-in-law one, and a fly-in-the-beer one. It sounds odd, but works.

Pegabovine's Davis Wateracre sings a song about getting it on - then joined by Matthew Johnson, Abby Stobart and Luke Kennard for 'a poem to arouse'. It doesn't.

Josie Long tells what she claims is her only dirty joke. James Bachman does 'Everyone's favourite African dictator' Papa Christmas - with occasional worries that it's a bit racist, and offering to change it to Easter Amin. Natalie Haynes's Edinburgh show is Watching The Detectives - she finds the nearest thing she can to smut in a Jessica Fletcher novel.

Robin Ince finally arrives, and ups the dirtiness with a reading from Women's Sexual Fantasies. It starts good - but goes on too long. The comedy is in the details - but the woman in question has too much time on her hands.

Isy Suttie takes a turn as a US act singing about love, and being on the streets. Back to her normal English persona, she sings about Sainsburys. Wil Hodgson does a few gags, then he and Robin Ince have a Jack T Chick-Off. This author of Christian pamphlets gets his work mocked page by page - Robin Ince wins. Nathan Pillington talks about, and demonstrates, the predictability of the printed word. Then he does performance self-harm. Not nice.

Scott Capurro includes The War Of The Worlds and The Diary Of Anne Frank. They aren't dirty, but his content is - covering gigs where he's offended people. By now, this audience's reactions are slower than earlier in the evening, and it isn't his best night.

Peter Buckley Hill rounds off the night with a song, a dirty book extract, and a spoof mocking the Fringe. Two hours and 20 minutes after kick-off, the show is over.

Perhaps having no time constraint lets things drag. Maybe too many eager guests take too long. Despite the extra 80 minutes, with more general confusion (and a lack of host Robin Ince), The Dirty Book Club doesn't live up to the promise of a smuttier version of The Book Club.

*** *** ***


CREDITS

Cast Credits: (in these two performances): (alpha order): James Bachman. Johnny Candon. Scott Capurro. Bridget Christie. Natalie Haynes. Toby Hadoke. Peter Buckley Hill. Wil Hodgson. Robin Ince (host). Josie Long (host). Pegabovine: (alpha order: Matthew Henry Johnson. Luke Kennard. Abby Stobart. Davis Wateracre). Nathan Pillington. Isy Suttie. Asher Treleven (dance). Martin White (accordion).

Company Credits: (both shows): Director - Jon Briley. Technical Operator - Tom Searle. Producer - Jon Briley (GSOH Comedy). Company - GSOH Comedy.

END

(c) Gill Smith 2006

reviewed at Underbelly / The Book Club - Sunday 20 August 06 / The Dirty Book Club - Wednesday 23 August 06

Fringe Report (c) Fringe Report 2002-2009