HEADLINER MITCH BENN (Last minute change to the line up)

Comedy Comedy Comedy!!!

Here come 3 top comedians and our own brilliant compere Nick Wills performing cutting edge stand up at the home of Ketterings Arts scene …..

On Saturday 23rd February 2019 we have:

Headliner MITCH BENN

MITCH BENN is not only one of the most sought-after acts on the comedy circuit but is widely acknowledged as one of the best writer/performers of comic songs in the country. Mitch began his comedy career in Edinburgh in 1994. He moved to London in 1996 and quickly established himself as a comedy club “headliner” as well as a favourite on the university circuit.

Mitch is a regular writer and performer on “The Now Show” for BBC Radio 4 and “It’s Been a Bad Week” for BBC Radio 2. Three series of his successful Radio 4 show, “Mitch Benn’s Crimes Against Music” have been broadcast so far. He also presents “The Mitch Benn Music Show” on BBC Radio 7.

On TV, Mitch appears regularly on BBC1’s “The One Show” as the writer and arranger of “The Complaints Choir”. Mitch contributes occasional songs to Channel 4’s “Bremner Bird And Fortune”. He has also appeared on “The Last Word” for More4, “Gas” for Channel 4, “Live at Jongleurs”, “The Warehouse” and “Today With Des & Mel” for ITV, “The Comedy Store” for Channel 5, “The World Stands Up” for Paramount and “Raymaan Is Laat” for Dutch TV. He was the presenter of the paranormal discussion show “Out There” for Carlton World, and in 2009 made semi-regular appearances on BBC1’s “Watchdog” performing songs highlighting consumer grievances.

Mitch’s second album “Radio Face” was released through Laughing Stock records in 2002. His earlier live album, “The Unnecessary Mitch Benn” is still available.

Mitch has toured extensively abroad, including Hong Kong, Singapore, Dubai, France, Montreal, Holland, India and South Africa (including a two-week run at the Grahamstown Theatre Festival in 1998). In 1995 Mitch won the Best New Comic award at the Glastonbury Festival and has played there every year since, including an hour-long extended set in 1999 which drew a standing ovation from an audience of 1,500.

In 1998 he won the “Mercury Comedian of the Year” prize at the Leicester Comedy Festival. Mitch has performed many times at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, including hour-long solo shows in 1997, 98 and 99. He also appeared in the successful revue show “The Bootleg Bootleg Beatles” in 1998 and the showcase “Carlton Comedy Warehouse” in 1999, the subject of a documentary series for Carlton TV.

In 2003 Mitch formed the band Mitch Benn & The Distractions with Kirsty Newton and Tash Baylis; after a successful run at the 2003 Edinburgh Fringe they took up a residency at The Bedford in Balham in October 2003. Mitch Benn & The Distractions completed a successful national UK tour in autumn 2004, to coincide with the release of their album “Too Late To Cancel”

Mitch Benn & The Distractions’ debut single, Everything Sounds Like Coldplay Now, was released on September 5th 2005, ahead of the release of the album Crimes Against Music. The video for the single was posted online at www.everythingsoundlikecoldplaynow.com, attracting 8,000 hits in one hour. The band completed their second UK tour in December 2005.

Mitch brought a reconvened Mitch Benn And The Distractions back to the Edinburgh Fringe in August 2007, performing a nightly two-hour show – The Mitch Benn Music Club – at the prestigious Reid Hall concert venue (the “Cow Barn”). A live album, recorded on the last night of the festival, entitled “Official Bootleg Edinburgh 2007” (or “The Brown Album”) was released in October 2007 to coincide with the start of another national tour, which concluded in December 2007. 

In spring 2008, Mitch released the controversial single Happy Birthday War (with accompanying video) and later on that same year, the album Sing Like An Angel, from which the title track (featuring Rick Wakeman on piano) was released as a single.

In 2009 Mitch & The Distractions (with Ivan Sheppard now permanently installed as drummer) completed the Where Next? tour, in support of the album of the same name.

In 2010, Mitch & the band completed the Rhyme Lord tour and also released the highly popular single “I’m Proud Of The BBC”, for which Mitch received the Media Blog Media Hero Of The Year Award.

‘The country’s leading musical satirist’ The Times

‘Song after song of exquisitely crafted satire’ The Scotsman

‘Well crafted, well sung, his songs are just plain funny’ The Guardian

Evelyn Mok

BBC New Talent Hotlist 2017

Time Out Comedy’s One to Watch

The Guardian’s Top Ten Jokes of the Fringe 2017

Nominated for ‘Female Comedian of the Year‘ and ‘Show of the Year‘ at the 2018 Swedish Stand-Up Gala, Evelyn Mok is the best thing to come out of Sweden since… IKEA? A stand-up comedian and actor born in Sweden to a father from Hong Kong and a Chinese mother born and raised in India, Mok challenges pre-disposed stereotypes with an unapologetic style and sharp witted hilarity.

Shortly after moving to London, she was quickly selected for the prestigious Pleasance Comedy Reserve and Just the Tonic’s Big Value Showcase also garnering finalist positions in the Chortle Student Comedy Awards and Leicester Square Theatre’s New Comedian of the Year Award. A seasoned live-act, she performs stand-up comedy across the UK and Europe, most recently supporting Josie Long and Paul Foot on their European tours.

On television you can catch up with Evelyn on the likes of Chris Ramsey’s Stand Up Central for Comedy Central alongside the best UK comics and she was recently a guest on Nick Helm’s Eat Your Heart Out for Channel Dave. A talented actor, Evelyn has starred opposite Rhys Darby in the C4 Comedy Blap ‘Furious Andrew‘, Andi Osho’s Twin Thing comedy short for Sky Arts, and BBC3 Comedy’s Big Field, where she played various characters in the luxurious setting of a cold, wet British field to very funny consequences! She has also guest starred in Sam Simmons’ Comedy Blap, Wallstud: Spincycle for Channel 4, Tim Renkow‘s Comedy Feed, A Brief History of Tim for BBC3.

Fresh off her Soho Theatre run, her “powerful debut” (Chortle) ‘Hymen Manoeuvre’ was “a refreshing hour of finely crafted stand-up” (★★★★ The Skinny) garnering her favourable mentions by Sarah Millican and Graham Norton, and winning her ‘Best Comedy Newcomer’ at The Pleasance’s Indies Awards.

In her native Sweden, Mok has appeared on the local versions of ‘Would I lie to you‘ (Tror du jag ljuger), ‘Fonejacker‘ (Telefonpiraterna), ‘Have I got News for You’ (Hårdvinklat) and ‘Evelyn’s videoblogg‘ her own 10-part webb-series based on one of her comedy characters, which she wrote and starred in for the Swedish National Broadcasting Network (SVT).

Currently, Evelyn is developing her own sitcom with Emmy Award winning production company ME&YOU and has already performed a live-version of the script for an enthralled audience at The Soho Theatre in London. Certainly living up to Time Out Magazine’s statement ‘One to Watch’, this very talented comic is questioning the norms of convention and boldly breaking the mould of what it means to be a woman of colour in comedy.

AL LUBEL

Al has one of the best jokes I have ever heard

Jerry Seinfeld

A terrifically funny comedian

David Letterman

Winner of the Amused Moose Judges Prize for his 2013 Edinburgh show, yet one of the last comics to appear on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson (making six more appearances with Jay Leno and five appearances on the Late Show with David Letterman), Al Lubel daringly straddles the worlds of quirky and original material lapped up by critics and TV-ready comedy watched by millions. He’s supported Jerry Seinfeld, who kindly mentioned “Al has one of the best jokes I have ever heard” and recently fellow comic Adam Bloom gave him high praise by saying Al had “the most original first ten minutes of comedy I’ve ever seen.”

Al Lubel became a lawyer to satisfy his mother. He then quit the law and became a stand-up comedian to satisfy his need to disappoint her. Al practiced law during the day and comedy at night. Getting stage time is hard for a new comic so Al would suddenly stand up in the middle of restaurants and do his act. And as he says, “I almost always got big laughs because I had everyone’s complete attention because everyone was scared that I might hurt them.” Al gradually began getting work at comedy clubs and within a year he won the $100,000 Comedy Grand Prize on television’s Star Search.

Al Lubel takes all of the attributes that gave his 2013 show such cult appeal and does more of them, marrying existential angst, metaphysical enquiry and lexical mischief for a performance quite unlike anyone else at the Fringe.

Jay Richardson, Scotsman

Doing the Tonight Show was a childhood fantasy, so Al auditioned and became one of the last comics to appear with Johnny Carson. He went on to make six more appearances with Jay Leno and five appearances on the Late Show with David Letterman. Al was the subject of the documentary, A Standup Life, directed by Peter Lydon for the BBC. A documentary about American stand-up comedy, it features Jerry Seinfeld, Bob Hope, Mort Sahl and Joan Rivers. Al has played an attorney on the Blake Clark HBO Comedy Hour. He has also played played Bill Walton’s sidekick in the the ESPN series, Bill Walton’s Long Strange Trip.

Unimaginable neuroses, spiralling self-reflection, towering mother issues … all your favourites. But boy does he bring it all together into one truly brilliant comedy show.Paul Fleckney, London Is Funny

Al’s solo show, Mentally Al, won the Amused Moose Award Judges Prize as the best one person show in the 2013 Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Two years later he was nominated for best performer of a solo show by the Barry Awards at the 2015 Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

But Al does admit to missing the practice of law. He says, “I’d like to have just one more trial, something serious like a murder trial because right before I give my closing argument and my client’s fate hinges on every word I say I want to see his face when I turn to him and whisper, I’m a comedian!”