Glasgow Comedy Festival highlights: Six must-see shows

Jay Richardson picks half a dozen hot tickets at this year’s Glasgow International Comedy Festival

Sarah Keyworth

A small woman who wants to be a big, strong, emotionally repressed man, Sarah Keyworth: Pacific (13 March, Berk’s Nest @ Old Hairdressers), relates the likeable Midlander’s struggles with gender, sexuality and the differences between cats and dogs.

Eleanor Tiernan: Enjoying the Spotlight Responsibly (15 March Blackfriars Basement) establishes the Irish émigré as a pity object for her friends and family, but there’s a deceptively sharp and distinctive mind behind her logic-askew epiphanies. This criminally underrated comic is overdue the spotlight.


John Shuttleworth’s Back (17 March, King’s Theatre), finds South Yorkshire’s mild-mannered keyboard troubadour loath to moan about the aches in his spine and sharing a mix of new songs and classics like Two Margarines and I Can’t Go Back To Savoury Now.


At once hi-tech, ramshackle and wilfully stupid, Mat Ewins’ Test Screening (22 March, ARG @ Blue Arrow) promises more inspired nonsense and laptop-enabled messing about from a comic who eschews mainstream recognition.


After three years away, Dane Baptiste: The Chocolate Chip (27 March, Tron Theatre) finds the thoughtful, articulate stand-up ruminating on racism, mental health, the alt-right and identity politics.


Knockabout duo Amy Gledhill and Chris Cantrill present a double-bill of their Edinburgh Comedy Award-nominated hour and new stand-up from the fast-rising Gledhill, in The Delightful Sausage: Ginster’s Paradise & Amy Gledhill (28 March, State Bar). Masterful daftness.



The Glasgow International Comedy Festival runs from 12 to 29 March, glasgowcomedyfestival.com