Tickets on sale now: Novice stand-up grabs gig at the Fringe just weeks after starting out
To give a flavour of how ‘seat-of-your-pants’ the premise is, we’re conducting this article interview just a few hours before final deadline over a video call to Iceland. Not the supermarket, but a campervan in the Scandinavian wilderness, with a comic who can’t stop smiling with giddy excitement at breaking her duck on one of the greatest world stages.
Courtney Buchner says she’s an actor who was too scared to call herself a stand-up, and shied away from taking on the challenge, despite already being an award-winning playwright and a BBC leading light for emerging content creators.
It took a talking to from her peers, who said her play was more stand-up comedy than it was drama, and her sister-in-law, who helped her focus on her end-game before she decided to have a go. In June this year the 29-year-old professionally trained actor was convinced to give comedy gigs a go, and decided to put herself out there despite the fear of failure.
“I thought maybe one or two five minute gigs a month would get me started,” she said. “But then I got an email to say the Edinburgh Fringe had a few slots left for last-minute artists and I thought, “why not?”.
So here she is, six weeks later parked up in a campervan near a fjord, working on her fun, playful and utterly unpredictable show, where the audience help choose the set every night, and then can vote out their least favourite sketches. With a 21-show run, no two shows will ever be the same, and she promises the best anecdotes will be finely honed, despite the title “I Wrote This Show Last Night”.
How it works
Every night, Courtney will present the audience in the 20-seater ZOO Playground at High School Yards, EH1 1LZ, with a choice of 12 props. Each prop will reference an autobiographical, yet fun-filled story. Some may have their roots in a darker past, as much comedy does, but the audience will be drawn into the charming world of Courtney Buchner, and will find themselves willing her on and revelling in the laughs, commiserating or even correcting, when it goes wrong. They pick three props, get three stories, then vote for their favourite. The remaining two are left on the cutting room floor with Courtney pledging to do better and re-write one by the next day.
The props themselves won’t give the game away, but you may venture into the world of crime scenes, therapy, and subjects which earn the show a PG16 rating.
Courtney said: “When you are younger you relish the fear of the unknown, but that becomes a fear of failure that stops you when you get older. It certainly stopped me from considering if what I was doing, what I was writing, could even be called stand-up. But I am facing my fears, taking the audience with me, and winging it in the best possible way.
“The audience will be part of my success, or failure, as we figure it out together. It will be a lot of fun. It’s a show about not knowing what you should be doing in life – but doing it anyway. ”
Face your fears – and Courtney’s – at this comedy gig with a difference. Book your tickets here.
You can also follow her on TikTok (Courtney Buchner - TikTok) where one million people have liked her sport and comedy content.