Feck! Arse! Hanlon!

Today we confirmed Ardal O’Hanlon for February’s Hitchin Mostly Comedy, which was the act I was intimating I was trying to snare yesterday (in a non-hunting capacity, of course).

Often, when I find myself feeling less enthused about Mostly Comedy, or I worry about how we’re going to follow and / or better the people we’ve already had on the bill, something like this comes up and brings back the excitement. Ardal is someone I’ve longed to have at the club for years, and finally the diaries allow it. The thought of meeting and sharing a stage with him, however briefly, is a thrill.

(I’m starting to sound like a fangirl.)

I was talking to my friend Stephen today about it, when I realised that Ardal O’Hanlon was one of the first people to make me aware of stand-up. I have a dim memory of watching him host a mixed-bill programme on telly - clearly lured in by the fact I was a fan of Father Ted - and vaguely taking on board that I was watching a performer I liked do something a little different. If you told me that however many years later I’d book him at my own club, I’d brand you a witch. Like with Paul Daniels, Phill Jupitus, John Thomson and Rory Bremner, O’Hanlon is a performer that I really admired and had been a long-term fan of; I remember quoting Father Ted with Simon Offord in a Year 9 physics lesson, damn it.

Here’s to 2017, which already looks set to be a great year for Glyn’s and my comedy club side-project. If you want to book to see this particular gig, tickets go on general sale on Monday of next week.