The Festival may look like a walk in the park for performers but behind the facade there is an undercurrent of despair, depression, financial ruin and failure, comedians share the tears behind the laughter.

Not so much an Edinburgh nightmare, more an indication of the sort of narcissitic personality disorder that is the inevitable by-product of walking around a city that has A1 posters of your face plastered everywhere. We had our second preview last night and, just before the show,
I walked past the queue and heard an enthusiastic 20 something discussing Pappy’s: “I saw them live and they were great, then I saw them on TV and they were SHIT!” Now, although he’s right (we tried very hard with our TV pilot but, ultimately, it wasn’t great) it was still a bit upsetting to hear it aloud.

After the gig, the same fellow came bounding up to me to say how much he’d enjoyed the show. For some reason my brain decided to accost him on his earlier assertion and I blurted out, “I heard you talking about us earlier… about us being shit on TV.” I had no second move planned, except perhaps to explain how tricky it is to make good television, but was utterly unprepared for his response, “I wasn’t talking about you, I was talking about Horne and Corden”.

Hopefully, this has taught me a valuable lesson about self-obsession. Only the rest of the month/my life will tell. But punters beware, even your most private conversations may well be eavesdropped on by a fragile performer so, if you can’t say something nice… at least explain in no uncertain terms who the nasty shit you’re saying is about.

Matthew Crosby

Pappy’s: All Business – Pleasance One 7:20pm