Perrier judge attacks Fringe comedy

Perrier judge Fiona Sturges has slammed the state of comedy at the Edinburgh Fringe.

She says this year's festival is dominated by "truly abominable" comics with lazy, unimaginative material.

And, after enjoying only two of the 35 shows she has seen, Sturges admits she's starting to harbour murderous thoughts towards derivative comics.

Writing in the Independent, where she is comedy critic, Sturges says: "If I could hand out prizes for sheer lack of imagination, two-thirds of the acts at the Fringe would be winners.

"Observations rarely get more incisive than the innate stupidity of Big Brother and the eternal conundrum of odd socks. You might have hoped that we'd reached a stage when gags about mother-in-laws, nagging wives and hateful boyfriends were deemed old hat.

"The sketch show, a comic aberration that should have gone out with the Eighties, lives on at the Fringe too."

She also bemoaned the lack of radical political comics, the number of character comics performing as unsavoury stereotypes and the dearth of interesting female comics.

The only show she concedes to have enjoyed is that of the visual duo Men In Coats (pictured).

This year's Perrier shortlist is published on Wednesday.

Published: 16 Aug 2002