THE VERY best names in Irish and international comedy - performing stand-up shows in the Róisín Dubh - will feature on your TV screens over the next few weeks.
This is Stand & Deliver which will be broadcast on RTÉ 2 at 10.20pm over the next six Mondays, with the first episode being broadcast on Monday January 10 and featuring performances from Eleanor Tiernan, Steve Hughes, and Stewart Lee. Every show will be presented by Apres Match’s Barry Murphy.
Stewart Lee reached No 41 on Channel 4’s 100 Greatest Stand-Ups and has been described by Time Out as “one of the top three or four living stand-ups.”
He began his career as a stand-up in 1988, winning the Hackney Empire new act of the year award in 1990. Throughout the 1990s he contributed to various BBC Radio comedy shows and performed on the London circuit. He also directed The Mighty Boosh’s breakthrough Edinburgh show, Arctic Boosh in 1999.
In 2001 he was invited to help write the libretto of, and direct Jerry Springer, The Opera. The show won four Olivier awards after its National Theatre run, though it was prevented from enjoying any commercial future by the pressure group Christian Voice.
Stewart’s subsequent three stand-up shows, 2004’s Stand-Up Comedian, 2005’s 90’s Comedian, and 2007’s 41st Best Stand-Up Ever, enhanced his reputation and public appeal and contributed to BBC2’s decision to commission his 2009 series, Stewart Lee’s Comedy Vehicle. A new series of Comedy Vehicle is due later this year.
He has also written the novel, The Perfect Fool (2000 ), a book on comedy, How I Escaped My Certain Fate (Faber and Faber 2010 ), and the theatre pieces Pea Green Boat (2002 ), What Would Judas Do? (2007 ), and Johnson and Boswell, Late But Live (2007 ). He also composes music.
Before he became a comedian Steve Hughes spent a decade rehearsing, recording and touring as a drummer. Then one day, he decided to walk around to the front of the kit and engage the audience. Then he tried it without the band and a comic was born.
Since then Steve has appeared all over Australia, won the Green Faces Comedy Competition 1997, was voted Australian Comedian of the year in 1998, and hosted MTV in Australia.
Eleanor Tiernan has performed at the Kilkenny Cat Laughs Comedy Festival, the Galway Comedy Festival, and the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. She was also a semi-finalist in Paramount Comedy’s So You Think You’re Funny? competition.
She has also appeared on RTÉ’s The Liffey Laughs, BBC’s One Night Stand, and played the ditzy waitress Emer on RTÉ’s The Café.
The other Stand & Deliver programmes will feature Reginald D Hunter, Milton Jones, and John Colleary (January 17, 10.20pm ); Jason Byrne, Josie Long, and John Lynn (January 24, 10.20pm ); Sarah Millican, Mike Wilmot, and Karl Spain (January 31, 10.20pm ); Glenn Wool, Colin Murphy, and Gearoid Farrelly (February 3, 10.20pm ); and Andrew Maxwell, Carl Barron, and Jarlath Regan (February 10, 10.20pm ).
Repeats of Stand & Deliver can also be seen on the RTE iplayer.
