Five festival over-achievers

This article is from 2009.

Robin Ince

One can only assume that Robin Ince sits in a thick blue funk for that small portion of the day when he isn’t A) hosting a ‘lunchtime celebration of science and the wonderful’, B) being a ‘bleeding-heart liberal’ or C) opposing ‘the moral majority’ for his free evening show. How these people stop their funnybones falling off is anyone’s guess.

Carol Ann Duffy

The new poet laureate is off to a flying festival start. She’s doing a ten-day run at the Scottish Storytelling Centre on top of her two Book Festival appearances, and, perhaps even more excitingly, an adaptation of The World’s Wife will be premiering at Assembly throughout the month (see preview, page 63).

Phil Nichol

Phil Nichol gets name checked no fewer than five times in this year’s Fringe listings. Two of those are admittedly for one-off shows, and one is for ‘Phil Nichol’s famous London club’ (Old Rope), but that still leaves two daily plays (The School for Scandal and Gagarin Way) and an hour each night of scheduled unpredictability.

Daniel Kitson

The Interminable Suicide of Gregory Church starts at 10.15pm at the Traverse and runs for an hour-and-a-half. His stand-up show at The Stand starts at 11.59pm and lasts one hour and 31 minutes. That’s 14 minutes for Kitson to sprint from the West End to Queen Street. They’re both solo shows. If he pulls that off, the man’s doing well.

Lionel Blair

He may be entering the ‘venerable’ period of his life, but Lionel’s still a game old bird. The gloriously named Tap and Chat with Lionel Blair ought to get the funny juices flowing in time for lunch, while The School for Scandal in the afternoon will all be over in time for the former star of Give Us a Clue to go and watch some evening shows.