The latest Brighton Festival and Fringe reviews from Team ThreeWeeks. Look out for more ThreeWeeks reviews here in the eDaily and every morning in The Argus each day in May. Hurrah.

A Guide To ThreeWeeks Ratings:
1/5 - somewhere around about God-darn awful, though possibly it's so bad it's good.
2/5 - just not any good really, sorry.
3/5 - good for what it is - if you like this genre, probably worth a try
4/5 - now, this is what we are talking about, a fine example of this genre
5/5 - oh Lord, so damn good, whatever the genre, go see this show if you can

COMEDY

Open Wide
White Room Theatre/ Bite-Size
Britain has a long history of distinguished comedy duos and there was something in the air down in the Cella tonight to suggest these guys could, with the right material, be next in line. This show had essence of everything required for a good sketch show. It had original and funny scenarios – stand outs included Justin Timberlake presenting BBC learning programmes and Adolf Hitler being exposed by Columbo. The pair were good comedic actors, well equipped to transform into the numerous characters, one even sporting an Eric Morecambe style glasses twitch. But, despite all this, it seemed to lack the indefinable factor that makes a good sketch show into a side-splittingly brilliant sketch show. It was certainly enjoyable, though, and definitely has potential.
Cella @ Sanctuary Cafe, 9, 10, 16, 17 May, 9:30pm, £8.00 (£6.00), fringe pp19.
tw rating 3/5
[rt]

The Moops
The Moops stand confidently astride the doors of ironic spitfire comedy. In this all-too-short performance, the London trio presented their audience a brand of contemporary humour with an astounding emotional sensibility. With what might initially appear to be comedic clichés, The Moops would time and time again surprise the audience with performance twists that shine a light into the irony of irony - your mind spinning yet? It will after this hour-long show. Touching upon issues of surprising cultural relevance, this energetic threesome emerged with great personality and comedic agility. Despite a few not-gonna-happen jokes, The Moops never lost face. This is not a show to miss, if you have the opportunity, not too dark, but certainly not too soft, The Moops are just right.
Udder Place, 8, 11 May, 6:15pm, £10.00 (£8.00), festival pp21.
tw rating 4/5
[cp]

GSOH at Upstairs at Three and Ten – Robin Ince
Good Sense of Humour / Otherplace Productions
This was British cynicism summed up in an hour. The self deprecating yet undeniably confident humour of Robin Ince is reminiscent of a far too drunk and far too clever uncle going on a long, drawn out rant on Christmas day. Agitated, fast and frantic, Ince covered everything from Boris to Burma, with one slight pause for thought – "Am I being too current?". His loud and liberal outlook is topical and witty, and just what one would hope to see in a satirical stand up show. Sharp, honest and mildly offensive, Ince had the crowd in hysterics by saying exactly what they were all thinking, only funnier and with more fury. The third night in a line up of ten, with a different act on each night, Ince is a hard act to follow, but if the standard is this high then get down there and check out his fellow comedians.
Upstairs at Three and Ten, 5 - 23 May (not 7, 10, 11, 12, 13, 17, 18, 20), 10:00pm, £7.00 (£5.00), Fringe pp17
tw rating 4/5
[ap]

MUSIC

The Great American Songbook
Alyson Green and her Jazz Trio
A real mix this Friday night at the Joogleberry Playhouse - in 'The Great American Songbook' Alyson Green and her Jazz Trio featured a series of arrangements from both a catalogue of Jazz standards and a handful of contemporary pieces. With an elegant sizzle to her voice, Alyson Green charmed her audience - something necessary for the success of this performance, given that she was forced into a musical tug-of-war with a nearby stage whose music was all too audible during her set. With a certain musical grace, if lacking perhaps distinction in range and colour, Alyson Green and her Jazz Trio managed an impressive set, kept together by an impeccable sound and good humour.
Joogleberry Playhouse, 9 May, 10:00pm, £9.00 (£7.00), festival pp37.
tw rating 4/5
[cp]

Caroline Nin
Squeezed into the tightest frock you've ever seen, split so high up the thigh it made my eyes water, the Parisian ambassador for old-school glamour, Caroline Nin, belted out her set accompanied by pianist Sean Hargreaves. Nin has a voice to be reckoned with, one that can sing in three languages and pull off Piaf well, but this was not an evening based solely on music; a seduction mission was clearly afoot. Put it this way, Nin knew exactly where to move her hands over that skin-tight gown. However, the scene-setting stories tended to ramble and her lament that prostitutes are no longer called 'girls of joy' made me splutter. Did I leave seduced? Not really, whilst it is undeniable that the lady is a vamp, it all felt a bit too cruise ship for my liking.
Komedia, 8 May, 11:00pm, £14.00 (£12.00), fringe pp8.
tw rating 3/5
[jh]

THEATRE & MUSICALS

Bite-Size 'Soirée'
White Room Theatre
Perfectly encapsulating the spirit of the Fringe, nine succinct little pieces by actors from all over the world performed in a groovy café basement. Often focusing on love lives, from meeting people to marriage and sex, these shorts also covered more major issues, such as trying to get a seat on the tube! There were some great twists, such as the portrayal of the affectionate couple discussing their marriage who turned out to be bank robbers, and my favourite, the two pyjama-ed performers locked in serious conversation before donning their ridiculous costumes. This collection had everything from a dark nightmare to a hot smooth-skinned adonis playing kinky games - even the most attention deficient of the 'me' generation would have difficulty not staying engrossed.  
Cella@Sanctuary Café, 9-10, 16 & 25 May, 7:30pm, £8.00(£6.00), fringe pp40.
tw rating 4/5
[se]

Womb Man/ Whacker Murphy's Bad Buzz 
Back Of the Hand/ RJ Arts
While 'Whacker Murphy' is a bit mental, 'Womb Man' is stark raving mad. Two frenetically energetic actors perform two extremely different one-man pieces that they have written themselves. Murphy's desperate bid to find the one and a half grand he owes is both dark and funny, like an Irvine Welsh set in Dublin. The first piece, however, is much more surreal, as rubber-faced Ricky Payne morphs into a vast array of historical and religious figures from Christ to Cleopatra, in an attempt to understand man and woman. Edwin Mullane as Murphy is a master storyteller who has created an entertaining tale of brawls, madcap schemes and surprising emotion. Payne's goes well beyond this, into a warped nightmare where Hitler is asking a female audience member for sex.  
Upstairs At Three And Ten, 9-11 May, 4:00pm, £8.00 (£6.00), fringe pp47.
tw rating 4/5
[se]

Around The World On 80 Quid
Ruckus
Eyes popping, fiddle playing Irish scally, telling tall tales of his misadventures causing havoc across the world interspersed with musical interludes. It would have been better if he hadn't made the fiddle whine like it was in pain. Capitalising on the worst type of stereotype – that of the drunken foolish Irishman – I found it difficult to find much to laugh at; but maybe I've just known too many scallies. I had picked this piece out to go and see on the basis of its title, but just like using this method to choose a horse to bet on, this was a bad idea. Although this piece left me cold and I couldn't wait for it to finish, there were loads of people in the audience who were clearly amused by his antics.
Upstairs at Three and Ten, 10, 11, May, 'times vary', £8.00 (£6.00), Fringe pp40.
tw rating 2/5
[sla]

Reviewed in the ThreeWeeks eDaily tomorrow...
The Lansdowne Mews Artists, Stephen K Amos, The Jamestown Union and Samantha Horwill, Sally Ann Hayward, The Birthday Club/Comic Angels Present, Mac's Lyrical, The Haunted Moustache, The Nightmare Factory. Some of these reviews will appear first in tomorrow's Argus.

ThreeWeeks Reviewers Guide...
Sarah Agnew [sla], Steve Bromley [sb], Kate Charles [kc], Seth Ewin [se], Sean Farrance-White [sfw], Joel Gunter [jg], Jess Hookway [jh], Jessica Nero [jn], Laura Oliver [lo], Clearhos Papanicolaou [cp], Anna Pearce [ap], Richard Tatnall [rt].

ThreeWeeks is the flagship media at the Edinburgh and Brighton Festivals. Its mission is to provide as comprehensive coverage as is humanly possible of both these festivals, in particular reviewing those shows not getting media coverage elsewhere.

We launched ThreeWeeks in Edinburgh in 1996 because at that time the Edinburgh Festival was growingly hugely each year, but at the same time media coverage was, if anything, decreasing. That meant that many strands at the Festival - and especially the new, alternative and grassroots performers and companies which, as far as we could see, were what made the Edinburgh Festival so exciting in the first place - were not getting the coverage they deserved. From year one ThreeWeeks aimed to cover as many aspects of the Festival as possible, from the big names at the big venues through to the real grass roots shows not covered elsewhere. Over a decade later we continue to operate to that ethos, getting even closer to achieving it by reviewing over 1500 shows each Edinburgh Festival - nearly all of them - and hundreds more than our closest competitors.

Since 2006 we have applied the same ethos in our coverage of the Brighton Festival. This year we will have over 25 student reviewers seeing shows. You can read their reviews via this eDaily, our website and through a daily column in The Argus. We also offer a bucket load of previews and interviews on and with some of our favourite shows and performers, on our website, and via our free ThreeWeeks Guide to the Brighton Festival, available all over Brighton from 6 May.

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