Billy Kirkwood
GICF Bruce Morton
How does Glasgow compare to other comedy festivals? Billy Kirkwood It’s got a great vibe with lots of fun gigs. Obviously you need big-name acts coming in, selling loads of tickets, but it’s fantastic for local talent. There are plays, sketches, improv, so many different things in different venues. The melting pot aspect is my favourite part. Bruce Morton I recall [Glasgow Comedy Festival director] Tommy Sheppard saying years ago, ‘I’m going to put a festival on in Glasgow, what do you think?’ And I thought, ‘it’ll be absolutely amazing if it works’. And he’s been proved right. Though they’re still struggling for a sponsor. . . Anna Devitt Creative Scotland ought to sponsor it. They’ll sponsor Gaelic, they’ll sponsor a different nationality’s children, they’ll sponsor paintballing. But they’ll not sponsor anything to do with comedy and that’s a bee in my bonnet. BK It would be nice to see some investment. You don’t want them interfering with the content, but
it’d be good to have a Scottish comedy showcase that you could take to the Adelaide Festival for example. Is it essentially two festivals, with Glasgow comics writing festival hours and bigger names just scheduling their tour to arrive here in March? BK Jimmy Carr is supporting the festival by lending his name to it. Besides, there are lots of local comics that will sell out shows, whereas guys who’ve had a bit of TV exposure will sometimes only get 30 people in. I’d like to see Gary Little’s face on the cover of the programme. BM Personally, I wouldn’t go to see Jimmy Carr at the Clyde Auditorium. But if he was doing a 20-minute set at the Festival Club, I’d be delighted. The vibe you’ve got in The Stand, you can touch the ceiling and have a conversation in there, it’s wonderful. It is a separate festival from these big, extravagant shows: no disrespect to them.
How much Glasgow-specii c material do you have? BK I’ll drop in local references wherever I play. But there’s nothing worse than launching into a ten-minute bit in Newcastle before realising it’s all about Glasgow. BM I’ve got bits I do here that I wouldn’t do elsewhere because it’s the culture I’ve grown up in. It’s a relief to be able to talk with the cadences, rhythms and idioms of Glasgow. When I was doing the Best of Scottish at the Edinburgh Fringe one night, I overheard a woman saying to her partner, ‘it’s a bit Scottish, though, isn’t it?’ What did she think she was getting? Chinese acrobats? BK ‘I’d like to talk to you about the Norwegian i sh industry.’ BM Niche comedy is one of the great things that’s been happening lately. There are thousands of stand-ups now, so what’s great is people doing shows out of love. Improv, the re-emergence of sketch, odd little things like Joke Thieves and Jo Cauli eld’s storytelling nights. That’s the most interesting development over the last i ve years. ➼ 5 Feb–2 Apr 2015 THE LIST 37