A Well Groomed Fringe... The Second...

• Pappy's: Great fun. Some excellent sketches and songs from the trio. Good pre-performance music, Tom crashing into the boxes, dressed as a pink elephant on a pogo stick and free badges at the end dished out by Crosby himself (bonus points). What more could you want?
• BBC Comedy Presents: I book the tickets for this a long time ago, so it was a bit of a lottery as to who was on the bill. I'll just rattle through them all - MC Carl Donnelly (a very good compere, bantered well with the front row, including a 19 year old who was getting married: this would be a recurring theme throughout the evening), Tom Allen (some good jokes improved by brilliant delivery), Chortle Student Winner Phil Wang (some fairly interesting material, the polish will come with experience), Ginger and Black (deadpan musical storytelling, very good timing), Matt Green (a good short set from the 12 year old...), Jon Richardson (some really funny general misanthropy and ranting). It was a mixed bag really, there were laughs but none of the acts are my particular niche of comedy, though I do like Donnelly and Richardson.
• Nat Luurtsema: I went to see Nat again, this time with Simon (contributor to this blog). It's fun to go to shows several times and see the tweaks and ad libs. Again, I thoroughly enjoyed myself and so did Simon. After this I was elevated to VIP status by Nat, who is so, so nice. You should all go and see her at various locations.
• Greg Davies: The only award nominee that I saw (excluding winner Russell Kane, who we covered yesterday) and he really earned his nomination. Detailing his life through a series of genuinely hilarious inconsequential moments devoid of meaning, Davies, a master raconteur, delivers an enormous amount of big, big laughs chronologically from birth to last Christmas via a decade as a depressed drama teacher to classes of eccentric children. The intimacy afforded by the Pleasance Upstairs (one of my favourite venues) perfectly suited the atmosphere. A must-see.
  
• Rob Deering's Beat This: I saw this on a bit of a whim. Having headed to the Dome after Greg Davies. There I bumped into Alex, who didn't have much time to talk as he was taking part in Beat This. Having nothing to do, I wandered to the box office and, as luck would have it, they had tickets left. I quickly bought one and latched onto the back of the queue as it entered the Jokerdome. Alex and his teammate one-liner merchant Gary Delaney were taking on improv-rap/songsters Abandoman. Beat This is essentially a comedy pop music quiz. As with other Fringe gameshows (Comedy Countdown et al) it's hard to evaluate it for this blog. The concept is strong and works well in practice, though I imagine, as is always the case with these things, quality is largely dependent on the quality of guest.
• The Invisible Dot Club By the Sea: Ferried by coach to a secret location, we were treated to a formidable bill of Kevin Eldon, Josie Long, Colin Hoult, Tim Key and Stewart Lee, all excellently compered by the magnificent Daniel Kitson. Needless to say all the acts were brilliant and the evening was marred only by an idiot heckler during Lee's set. Lee however, a consummate professional, dealt with it admirably by announcing that he'd been booked to do 20 minutes and the heckler could either let him get on with it and stop yelling out the punchlines, negating Lee's trademark slow-burning, repetitive delivery, or he could stand on stage in silence. And so it came to pass that Stewart Lee stood in silence for 5 solid minutes to laughter and applause before continuing with his act, sitting down and even lying down in defiance against the cretin in the balconies (who may have left by this point, I can't remember). Kitson was also responsible for the apparent suicide of one of the audience members during the interval (again, you had to be there, don't misconstrue this and get me sued for libel).
• Tim Key: Key has been one of my comedy heroes since I first heard Cowards on the radio and since then everything he's touched has been gold in my opinion from Mark Watson Makes the World Substantially Better to All Bar Luke to Space Hacks to Herb McGwyer to We Need Answers to Charlie Brooker's Newswipe... I could go on... and on... and on. Basically I'm a massive fan. Key returned triumphant to the Fringe with a 6 night run of last year's award-winning Slutcracker. Approaching the stage in shell suit and cap, smashing a golf club on the stairs, Key changed into his tattered suit and began the business of disarming, poetic comedy. I was tasked with holding the pint (which I did immensely nervously but, according to the man himself, successfully) as the master poet delivered brilliant poem after brilliant poem after excellent film after fantastic clambering over the audience. My night was made by meeting the man himself afterwards. Frankly amazing.

Strange Celebrity Spots

• TV's Dan Clark (wearing sunglasses... indoors)
• Neil Hannon (talking to David O' Doherty - how about that for a pair?!)
• David Mitchell (from a long distance after eavesdropping on a recording of The Unbelievable Truth ((a story for another time perhaps)))