The best of the week's live comedy

The week's best live comedy.

Monday February 18

SOUTHAMPTON: Chortle's annual hunt for the best new student talent kicks off at The Bridge in Southampton Uni - with a second heat in Warwick University on Thursday. We've helped uncover talents such as Joe Lycett, Simon Bird, Iain Stirling and Phil Wang in the past, so let's see what future stars the class of 2019 throws up…

LONDON: Adam Kay brings his hilarious and emotional memoirs about his time as an NHS doctor to life in the stage version of his bestseller This Is Going To Hurt, which returns to the Garrick Theatre in the West End for the first of several performances tonight. Dates and tickets

LONDON: Kiri Pritchard-McLean - whose new job as presenter of Radio 4 Extra's Newsjack is surely just the start of a long broadcasting career - brings her funny and personal show about a bad relationship, Victim, Complex, to the Soho Theatre for the week. Tickets are scarce, but she'll be back in May.

Tuesday February 19

LONDON: Here's one for the players. The game players that is, as The Video Game Game Show Show features comics playing arcade and home classics, with the chance for the audience to play along too. Go 8 Bit's Steve McNeil hosts, and tonight's guest at the Phoenix, near Oxford Circus, is Garrett Millerick.

Wednesday February 20

LEICESTER: Two UK tours kick off at the ongoing Leicester Comedy Festival. Talented musical impressionist Jess Robinson will be belting out hits like you've never heard them before in her No Filter show at The Cookie (full dates are here); while Shappi Khorsandi shares her 'confessions of a club comic' in Skittish Warrior at the Sue Townsend Theatre. Full dates.

Saturday February 23

WATFORD: As we head for Brexit chaos with an ineffective opposition and an insane, insecure, lying man-child in the White House, Mark Steel tries his best to be optimistic in his new tour, Every Little Thing's Gonna Be Alright, which starts at the Palace Theatre tonight. Dates.

LEICESTER: It's the final (indeed only heat, since the contestants are all recommended by UK comedy promoters) of the Leicester Mercury Comedian of the Year at the Y Theatre tonight. Taking part are Kathryn Mather, Daniel Sofoluke, Jen Ives, Riordan DJ, Jeremy Flynn, Simon Wozniak, Jamie Hutchinson and Krystal Evans.

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Published: 17 Feb 2019