The Good, The Bad and The Ugly The Stand HHH

By Josie Balfour
Published on Thursday 19 January 2012 15:25

The great thing about The Stand’s six-week run of shows, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly with Jo Caulfield and the Edinburgh Comedy Collective, is that they will be released as a podcast.

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Thus providing potential audiences with a chance to catch up on what they have missed at home, on the commute to work or even while they’re having a pint in the bar waiting for a show to start.

In her introductory warm-up, before the recording began, Caulfield brought up an interesting point about the show itself. Reminding the audience that the material in the show is new, experimental and takes performers out of their comfort zone, she asked reviewers not to go into the details of parts of the show that did not work – the suggestion being that the comedians themselves are experienced enough to know where their material requires polishing and the production needs tightening so it’s not necessary to cover the imperfections as they’re being ironed out.

Although reviews can often offer an interesting perspective for performers to hone their work, it must be said that a review is for the paying public so that they can make an informed decision about whether they should bother going to or downloading a show. It is not a request that is ever made by the comedians performing in The Stand’s Red Raw, where new material is nerve-wrackingly debuted by amateurs each week.

With an ever-changing line-up of guests, some of The Good, The Bad and The Ugly’s future stars look like good value for the fiver entrance fee. Yet the structure of the production is certainly not fixed and the discomfort of the performers taking part in the opening act was evident, only Caulfield holding the show together.

Post-interval, giving participants Keir McAllister and Graham Thomas time to prepare some new material, the team got into the swing of things and had the punters in gales of laughter.

Ending the evening were a trio of sketches by what can only be described as characters. Jay Lafferty’s anxious Wedding Countdown was served with a delicious twist, Joe Heenan’s Fred Nostradamus the Slightly Dangerous Stuntman wowed the crowd with his daredevil stunts and New York musician Lach indulged in some sublime banter.

Does it work as a whole? Well, thanks to the podcast you can get online and judge for yourself.

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