Strip-tease

DUBLIN, 27 JUNE – Once again it is that time of year when I must write some gossip on the Dublin Comedy Scene.

Firstly, it is crucial to express how great it is to back in the only place I know where all aspiring Taoisigh are driving a taxi or running a pub.

Last time the good people at lucky #13 Trinity asked me to do a few lines about the scene I was a bit caustic (HP27/05). Of course, after 15 years in New York, where you learn to wake up pissed off so you’re in sufficiently irascible mood when you show up for work, who could blame me?

Now, however, I have some good news for the lovely people on the North Side and some good news for the people on the South Side.

Although you North Siders will still have to bring your passports if you want to have a great night out of dinner and professional comedy with us at The Temple Bar Club in the IFC, you will no longer have to put up with as many South Siders.

The good news for you Southies is you will no longer have to travel up to City Centre and River Dance around the panhandlers, puke-puddles and emaciated pigeons making their way home from Sellafield. Instead, you’ll be able to relax in the warm atmosphere of a venue with a bar twice as big as the one in The Comic Strip, Temple Bar.

Why have we been bestowed with such a blessing you ask? Because the Gods of Comedy have smiled down on your unprecedented response to the Irish Film Centre, Temple Bar venue and so through the tireless efforts of our right hand man, Dara Kiernan, (who despite being from Dundrum and being half South African is really a great guy – a new venue has been cultivated and is about to launch.

The end of July will see the opening of a new club, The Comic Strip South, which will be located at Taylor’s Three Rock Bar in Rathfarnham.

Open Thursday nights at half nine, ten euros in, the first gigs will kick off during the last two weeks of July. Meantime, we highly recommend you watch the press, contact The Comic Strip IFC, or show up on the morning of the 24th and camp out in the parking lot until we get everyone around here organised!

Time to sign off here, but there’s something I would like to say, (if you hear sappy violin music coming up in the background about now, apologies. From the staff and the talent who play The Comic Strip, to everyone who supports the Dublin Comedy Scene, THANK YOU.

This is one of the most hostile countries in Europe in which to make a living as an artist.

The people are brilliant, but the government bodies empowered to control the purse strings reckon it’s more important to build theatres that’ll never get used or cut money from artist’s troupes than to actually help the thousands of talented artists in this country. It’s a bitch. And that’s exactly what I’m doin’. Bitchin’!

I’m Paddy Kelly, thanks for readin’, I’m outta here.

P.S. Get the hell down to the show Saturday night!