#barry ferns

[allsortsoflicorice]

I love this guy. I hardly ever subscribe to youtubers, but he is worth it.

[thejohnfleming]

That time Malcolm Hardee stole the contents of an entire toilet...

BEWARE! Toilet humour ahead! In December 2021, Barry Ferns interviewed me for the Angel Comedy Club’s  podcast. Back in April, I posted three blogs of transcripts from that chat – largely about the changes in UK comedy since the 1980s – slightly tidied up to avoid my wittering. Rather belatedly, this is how that 2021 chat concluded… JOHN: Some really good live stage acts are not necessarily…

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[thejohnfleming]

That time I tried to persuade comic Malcolm Hardee to fake his own death

Malcolm Hardee in his iconic spectacles In December 2021, Barry Ferns interviewed me for his Angel Comedy Club’s podcast. I recently posted a couple of transcripts from the start of that chat – largely about the changes in UK comedy since the 1980s – slightly tidied up to avoid my wittering. This is how the chat continued… JOHN: The heckling at Malcolm Hardee’s clubs was often as good as the…

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[thejohnfleming]

The changes in UK alternative comedy because of agents, Malcolm Hardee etc

This is Part 2 of a chat from December 2021, when Barry Ferns interviewed me for his Angel Comedy Club  podcast As with Part 1, it has been slightly tidied up to reduce my wittering incoherence. JOHN: We were talking about gag acts in comedy. A TV show like Live at the Apollo only wants gag acts. They want gag-gag-gag gag-gag-gag because they’re going to cut out two-thirds of them or half of…

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[thejohnfleming]

The 1980s... when UK comedy WAS bizarre on stage and sometimes TV...

In December 2021, Barry Ferns interviewed me for the Angel Comedy Club’s  podcast. This is a transcript of the start of that chat – largely about the changes in UK comedy since the 1980s – slightly tidied up to avoid my wittering. BARRY: When did you first move furtively into the comedy industry? JOHN: Difficult to say, because I’ve done all sorts of things. Most of my working life was in…

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[thejohnfleming]

I am lazy. Comedy club crowdfunding continues. Comic will change his name.

I am lazy. Comedy club crowdfunding continues. Comic will change his name.

(L-R) The founding four for Angel Comedy 2.0  – Barry Ferns (horizontal), Dec Munro, Rachel Warnes and Sarah Pearce

Oh Jesus.

Mea culpa.

Today is 21st July.

On 3rd June, I had a chat with Barry Ferns and Dec Munro about the Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign they had just started to help finance the new Angel Comedy2.0 comedy club in London’s Islington. The idea was that I could give their…

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[thejohnfleming]

Getting drunk at the Edinburgh Fringe and singing over a dead man’s body

Getting drunk at the Edinburgh Fringe and singing over a dead man’s body

The latest Fringe news (maybe) from Broadway Baby

My left shoulder is in middling agony if I move it. It is comedian Arthur Smith’s fault. More about that later.

This morning, I booked the Ballroom of The Counting House in Edinburgh on Friday 28th August next year from 11.00pm to 1.00am… for the increasingly prestigious annual Malcolm Hardee Comedy Awards Show. Next year is the tenth anniversary…

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[thejohnfleming]

Lionel Richie squatted in a London council flat and how comic Barry Ferns gives financial support to Michael Palin

Lionel Richie squatted in a London council flat and how comic Barry Ferns gives financial support to Michael Palin

Barry Ferns/Lionel Richie won 2014 Cunning Stunt Award (Photograph by Keir O’Donnell)

Comedian Barry Ferns lives directly opposite Monty Python star Michael Palin in Gospel Oak, London

Last year, he won the increasingly prestigious Malcolm Hardee Cunning Stunt Award.

Barry Ferns, not Michael Palin.

“I’m helping Michael out at the weekend,” Barry told me yesterday.

“Doing what?” I asked.

“I paid a…

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