Los Quattros Cvnts

I don’t often blog about comedy nights as my blog is usually used for thinking things through, but this week has been so great it deserves a ramble, so here goes.

LOS QUATTROS CVNTS

I have seen these four cunts before at their first show in November, so I was excited to go again (I did try another time, but it was cancelled so we had beer instead, lots of beer, but that is a story I will not tell on here). This time was different, firstly there was no Jeremy Limb as he decided to go cruising in Rio instead, however it was explained to us that this did not make it Los Trio Cunts (Michael Legge, Dan Mersh and Paul Litchfield) as there were two special guests who would help out as well as doing their own sets, Bennett Arron and Jeremy Lion (aka Justin Edwards). The other difference was that there were even more twitter people/podophiles (if you don’t know what a podophile is then Google Precious Little) to meet this time, it was quite a gathering. A few of us arrived in London nice and early and got to The Phoenix for around 5pm, the show didn’t start until 8pm but it gave us all time to chat and eat, ok and maybe drink a little.

Finally we took our seats, a great couple of tables one right at the front and one just to the side. If you haven’t been to The Phoenix before it is a great but intimate venue, so we were very close to the action. Oh I nearly forgot...

WARNING – My memory is a bit crap, so do feel free to correct me or tell me details I missed out if you were there and I will edit the blog. Oh and I would say there are spoilers, except each show is rather unique where LQC is concerned although there may be running themes/characters.

The show started grandly with the William Tell Overture blaring out of the sound system, however as the cvnts entered the stage they began pointing at a man in the front row in a rhythmic way, we were encouraged to join in, so of course we did. I have no idea how the man kept a straight face throughout the entire song but I applaud him.

Then followed some brief banter about the name of the show, trying not to say the cuntword because “the telly” was in. Then came the only “safe” sketch they could do for the telly people, The Party Sketch, a very funny play on the familiar face scenario, “I’m sure we’ve met before, where have we met before?”. Let’s just say it got a bit shouty.

I can’t remember the exact order of sketches so I will summarise the best bits (all of it).

The O’Flaherty Brothers and Billy Sunday made another appearance with another scary item of knitwear worn by Billy (Michael Legge). True to his nature Billy Sunday interrupted and objected to any attempts to sing lovely Irish folk songs, this time saying he wanted to do rap instead. He then proceeded into a tirade of gangsta style ranting mostly about putting a cap in yo ass mo fo. I did think the vein in the side of his head was about to burst as he got more and more red in the face.

The Erotica Sketch – Sean Golsworthy (played by Paul Litchfield) apparently he made his first appearance last time and read from his great literary works of erotica. This time we were in for a treat as there was a sci-fi theme which was “immediately and suddenly” about sex robots. In chatting to Paul after I believe the character may make further appearances at LQC which will be a treat.

Agony Uncle Doctor Party – This character was fantastically camp (well done Michael, I don’t know how you pulled it off) and I have no idea how Dan managed to keep a straight face as he read the letters out. I will say Doctor Party not only has some (well just one piece really) advice to overcome problems but he also has some fantastic dance moves. I loved that they pushed it with a rather controversial letter at the end from a lady who had been “locked in a cellar for 18 years...” it sounds wrong to say it was brilliant but it was.

History Sketch – Bennett Arron helped out on this one. I cannot remember all of the details but it was a summary of history as found on Wikipedia. It was definitely a “you had to be there sketch” as they confused history and tried to hide a baby. Bennett Arron looked almost in pain as he played Yoko Ono and had to do a dreadful accent.

TV ideas for BBC3 – Justin Edwards played the producer on this one, he rapidly binned numerous ever more increasingly ridiculous TV programme ideas, one of my favourites being a reality TV programme where we vote to put celebs in prison.

Improv Sketch – This one was made even more hilarious by the fact that Tara Flynn was sat just behind us in the audience (if you didn’t know, her and Michael are in London Improv a really good improv group which also plays at The Phoenix). They did a few improv games which were a comical view of how not to do it. My favourite part was the open scene game, usually the audience would give the improve group a name, a place and maybe a line, just two or three details and the sketch would begin. So of course open scene cvnts style we gave a name (Olivia), first line (breathe deeper), famous person (The Moomins), type of car she drove (The Bat tank), shoe size (4 or 7) and many more details, with pauses between so that Paul could “warm up” for each bit of added information. Just as the cvnts began to actually do the sketch, Sarah who I was sat next to shouted out the first line “Breathe deeper” as it was evident they had already forgotten that detail, they stumbled and then Paul pulled the shutter down (metaphorically) and closed the fourth wall, so he could no longer hear her. Of course the final resulting sketch was “Breathe deep Olivia, oh look The Moomins, the end”.

Bennett Arron’s Jesus Sketch – We were lucky to have a special guest, Jesus, who had only just started doing stand up, looked very nervous and uncomfortable in his unsecure beard. There were funny lines, we nerdy people particularly like “I don’t believe in Richard Dawkins, I don’t go to churches and pray to him, or as you call it The Bloomsbury”.

So as you can see a jam packed set from Los Quattros Cvnts, it was time for a short interval and then the special guests.

Bennett Arron – I hadn’t seen Bennett before his short set revolved largely around him being a Welsh Jew, and although I laughed at several bits (Jew Jitsu in particular) and enjoyed the anecdotes he didn’t appear very comfortable, and I was unsure if it was on purpose or not. Difficult to tell from such a short set.

Jeremy Lion – Another performer I had never seen before, although I did watch his 12 days of Christmas on YouTube, see here so I had some idea what to expect from an alcoholic children’s entertainer. Jeremy told us he is working on his Edinburgh fringe show and plans to teach the children about the environment this year. He then proceeded to sing the song “Ten Green Bottles” and as he recycled each bottle he pointed out what good that would do for the environment, e.g. save a baby seal. The only problem being that you are not allowed to recycle bottles when they are still full of booze, the blue WKD and wine seemed particularly painful and "Baileys, nature's Gaviscon!", all hilarious. I will go and see his show in Edinburgh, just to see if he can survive an hour of doing that!

As you can imagine it was definitely worth the trip down to London to see all of that, and then it was great to hang around for drinks and chat to everyone after. The highlights of that are as follows...

Finally saying hello to Dan Mersh! I have seen the cvnts a couple of times and spoke to them but for some reason Dan remained elusive. This time Sarah and I cornered him, it turns out he is a really nice guy, despite being off the telly! And yes he is the guy in the crunchy nut advert with the laptop umbrella.

Vicki making us all framed drawings of our avatars, they were ace and we all loved them. Although James Hingley did look a little bit shocked and scared.

Chatting to Tara Flynn about her Edinburgh show, which sounds amazing, so you should all make sure you go and see her.

Carl Austin (Tara’s husband and the love of Michael Legge’s life) making the statement “Emmerdale makes my anus itch!” Even with context it was a very random but funny statement to make.

Standing in the doorway with Andy, when a tramp stood between us and asked for 20p, I said I didn’t have my purse on me, which I didn’t (it was inside) and Andy said he couldn’t spare it. The tramp looked at us with disgust and turned to walk away; as he did he bent down and picked something up off the floor. He then turned and shouted “I’ll just fucking have this then shall I?” waving a £20 note at us. Jammy bastard.