mostly david ephgrave

And so Mostly Comedy has closed. Our closure statement (26.04.2022). Arriving at this decision was difficult. It went against my natural-born instinct to keep things going at all costs. My brain has an annoying habit of defining what I do on the times when it isn't plain sailing at the exclusion of any evidence to the contrary, and this was no exception. But the fact is the circumstances we found ourselves in thanks to the pandemic were unprecedented and extremely hard to fight, particularly when you have so little money to start with and are constantly calling in favours from friends to make the shows run smoothly on the day. Pre-show audience at a Hitchin Town Hall Mostly Comedy (June 2019) The sad thing is I had visions of it carrying on long into the future, though if I could find a way to outsource some of the admin, that would've helped. I liked the idea of reaching our twentieth anniversary - we were already close to our fourteenth - as, for some reason, the idea that it...

From September 2010, every month for two years, Glyn and I would carry four 4.5' square rostra 176 yards from Glyn's dad's chip shop to Mostly Comedy's then-venue The Croft before/after each gig, in all weathers, for a step in the venue floor to render them invisible when we put them in place. It was an utter ballache. Nine years on, these chunky wooden bastards still bug me. The Croft's stage was hardly the Palladium. And when I say "all-weathers", I genuinely mean all-weathers. The worst was snow, although it's not like a sunny day made it any more enjoyable. Not only were the rostra heavy, but they were also very cumbersome. They were wide and a nightmare to keep purchase; it was like holding a butter-coated tombstone with clammy hands. Navigating from A to B was akin to a scene from the Eric Sykes / Tommy Cooper film The Plank with equal slapstick; my knuckles practically dragged along the floor at the end of Orangutan-like arms by the end of our j...

Here are the answers to yesterday's quiz, for those who have been waiting with bated breath. Round One: Names. 1)     Gerald Wiley was a pseudonym for which famous comic actor and writer? ANSWER: Ronnie Barker. 2)     Give the Christian names of the four members of The Beatles, as they appear on their birth certificates. ANSWER: John, James, George and Richard. 3)     What is the real name of the magician ‘The Great Soprendo’? ANSWER: Geoffrey Durham 4)     Who is Richard Wayne Penniman better known as? ANSWER: Little Richard. 5)     What are the first names of the two original Blues Brothers? (Characters, not actors). ANSWER: Jake and Elwood. 6)     Name the Three Musketeers. ANSWER: Aramis, Porthos and Athos. 7)     What are the first names of The Famous Five? ANSWER: Julian, Dick, Anne, George and Timmy the Dog 8)  ...

Today, in a change to my usual output, I thought I’d set a quiz. I put it together for the one and only time I assumed the role of Question Master, for a quiz at The Croft in Hitchin back in 2013. The owner was stuck for someone to run it, so I put my hand up (not a euphemism). I really enjoyed compiling it. The main challenge was judging what was difficult and what wasn’t. Just because you know something doesn’t mean it’s general knowledge to everyone else. My tastes are pretty niche (and firmly rooted in the 1960s & 70s) – and I didn’t want my questions to solely reflect that. I haven’t included my favourite round, which was Guess the Song Intro, for fear of copyright infringement. One thing I will share is the best three incorrect answers of the night: ·       QUESTION: "Who played the title role in Monty Python's 'Life of Brian'? ANSWER: "The gay one". ·       QUESTI...