Showing titles in Performing Arts

The New Comedy Bible is a step-by-step, no excuses manual for writing, performing, and launching your career as a stand-up comic. Written by Judy Carter, the author of The Comedy Bible (2001), which was called by The Washington Post and Forbes as a “Comedy Essential”. This new book, penned in classic Carter’s style - part career coach and part comedy dominatrix - has 100 percent new content.

In the past when you put Sarah Millican outside, she asked things like: "Why? Where is the taxi? Do I need a cardie?" and said things like: "There'll be wasps. I've nothing to sit on. Is that poo? Can we go home?" But things have changed. Now she has outside slippers. She can tell a chaffinch from a tit (hey). But she still can't tell if it's an owl or her husband's asthma. Join Sarah Millican, one of the UK's most successful and multi-award-winning comedians as she delights her fans in her fourth stand-up show, Outsider.

In these fresh and hilarious personal essays, Mindy Kaling gives the inside scoop on her new role as single mom, the perks of being her own husband, and how she deals with social anxiety even at the most glamorous A-list parties. In between, the beloved actress, writer, and Hollywood power-bruncher gets Kanye West’d at her best friend’s birthday, thwarts an “only in LA” crime, and learns what it means to have it all.

This program was recorded at Brighton Centre, England.

Jo Brand is one of Britain's funniest and best-loved comedians. With a sharp eye for the absurd and in her own unique voice, she tells her story for the first time. What possessed her to become a professional comedian in the cut-throat world of stand-up comedy after 10 years as a psychiatric nurse? How did she deal with late-night drunken audiences? Raised in middle class comfort, Brand left home in her teens to live with someone entirely inappropriate.

Michael McIntyre is electrifying, his energy, charm and pinpoint observations leave the packed house baying for more. Michael McIntyre Live And Laughing also includes Michael's appearance on BBC1's Live At The Apollo.

Rich Hall's critically acclaimed grouchy, deadpan style has established him as a master of absurdist irony. Renowned for his expertly crafted tirades, quick-fire banter with audiences, and delightful musical sequences. Rich Hall's plainspoken, growling indignation and acerbic observations have an unerring talent for hitting his targets with precision every time, leaving his audience hanging on every word and winning him fans all over the globe.

From 2011 up until his death at the end of 2016, the inimitable AA Gill reigned supreme as Uncle Dysfunctional, Esquire's resident advice columnist. In this raffish, hilarious, scathing yet often surprisingly humane collection, Gill applies his unmatched wit to the largest and smallest issues of our time. Whether you're struggling to satisfy your other half, having a crisis over your baldness, don't like your daughter's boyfriend or need the definitive rules on shorts, leather jackets and man-bags, AA Gill has all the answers - but you'd better brace yourself first.

As we look forward to gradually emerging from lockdown over the summer, we're reuniting some famous, brilliant, funny women for a remote catch-up, where they mull over the highs and lows of the past year. They’ll celebrate International Women's Day by sharing their experiences and their hopes for a better future, as life starts to opens up again.

Laura Solon won the Perrier Award at the Edinburgh Festival in 2005 with her sensational debut show. She now returns to Radio 4 with a new series of her bittersweet comedy show packed with characters, monologues and sketches from this extraordinary writer and performer. There will be talking, not talking, some stories, and a lion made out of china. Aided by Rosie Cavaliero, Ben Moor and Ben Willbond, Laura Solon is a remarkable talent with an astonishing eye for detail and ear for voice.

Penguin presents the unabridged, downloadable audiobook edition of Monty: His Part in My Victory, written and read by Spike Milligan. 'It's all over. Von Arnheim has surrendered, and he's very angry.' 'This could mean war....' The third volume of Spike Milligan's laugh-a-line account of life as a gunner in World War Two resumes on the eve of victory in North Africa.

Wild and Crazy Guys is the larger-than-life story of the much-loved Hollywood comedy stars that ruled the 1980s. As well as delving behind the scenes of classic movies such as Ghostbusters, Beverly Hills Cop, The Blues Brothers, Trading Places and dozens more, it chronicles the off-screen, larger-than-life antics of Bill Murray, Eddie Murphy, Chevy Chase, Steve Martin, John Candy et al. It’s got drugs, sex, punch-ups, webbed toes and Bill Murray being pushed into a swimming pool by Hunter S Thompson, while tied to a lawn chair.

'I have just had one of those absolutely mad mornings when you go out to have a browse at tagines and end up coming home with a brand-new gas ring expander. I think I was probably as surprised as anybody. Sometimes life is just like that, isn't it?' Award-winning food writer Damien Trench takes you on a journey through his childhood and his early inspirations - culinary and otherwise - with occasional diversions to the present.

In her hilarious new show Sarah tells us about her favourite word, bra fitting, her road rage and how she lets her husband know 'tonight's the night'. Funny and frank, this is Sarah Millican at her very best.

Rhod recorded live on stage in Cardiff. Raw, personal and brutally honest, Rhod takes us on a no-nonsense journey into discovering humour when you have hit rock bottom. As wirth all Rhod's work, it is tremendously funny, insightful and thought-provoking.

Often imitated but never bettered, I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue is the only authentic antidote to panel games. This collection finds unflappable chairman Humphrey Lyttelton giving silly things to do to regular panelists Tim Brooke-Taylor, Barry Cryer and Graeme Garden, as well as special guests Stephen Fry and Rob Brydon. Highlights include old favourites such as One Song to the Tune of Another, 84 Chicken Cross Road, Sound Charades, New Definitions and of course the brilliantly baffling, fiendishly funny Mornington Crescent.

Danny Wallace had been staying in. Far too much. Having been dumped by his girlfriend, he really wasn't doing the young, free and single thing very well. Instead he was avoiding people. Texting them instead of calling them. Calling them instead of meeting them. That is until one fateful date when a mystery man on a late-night bus told him to 'say yes more'. These three simple words changed Danny's life forever. Yes Man is the story of what happened when Danny decided to say YES to everything.

The ground-breaking show that exploded on to TV screens in the 70's turning a whole host of club comedians into stars overnight. Frank Carson, Charlie Williams, Bernard Manning, Duggie Brown, Ken Goodwin and Stan Boardman amongst others. This re-union in Blackpool brings four of the original artists back on stage and also includes a great documentary with interviews and performances from the other stars.

Come Out, Come Out is a podcast about coming out of the closet, and it’s also a funny, joyful exploration of love, sex and the pursuit of happiness.

Room 101 is the anti-Desert Island Discs. Instead of picking the tracks, books and luxuries they love, guests are invited to banish their least favourite things to Orwell's eponymous chamber of horrors. Twenty-seven episodes of the show were broadcast on Radio 5 between 1992 and 1994, and it went on to run for 18 hit series on BBC TV before relaunching on Radio 4 in 2023. This specially curated collection contains 16 of the very best editions of the original radio series.