The Preston Frogcast: A New Way Of Seeing Comedy
Frog & Bucket Comedy Club
Last Thursday I went to the opening night of The Frog and Bucket’s Frogcast in Preston. Just to give you a bit of background, the Frogcast will be a monthly podcast recorded live from The Frog and Bucket, Preston, edited and then launched on to iTunes as a free download. In the times of Twitter, social networks, video streaming and file sharing I think it’s a natural progression for clubs of cultural importance to become available on the move.
The layout of the show is simple: Richard Massara – the UK’s number one Richard Bacon lookalike and self-proclaimed struggling open spot – hosts the night with admirable confidence. Three open spots are each given five minutes to showcase their talents, followed by an interviewed from Mr. Massara. The next section consists of one, more established act doing a twenty minutes set and again being interviewed. The last section will be a circuit headliner who is, again, interviewed. The night is recorded in its entirety for Richard to go home and edit himself before being broadcast the following day.
On this particular night the open spots were Hayley Ellis, Graham Goring and Peter Marshall and the Lomos, all three of which are the cream of open spot comedy, with 5 time new act award winner Sam Gore occupying the middle. Headlining was the unshakeable rising star Steve Shanyaski. Each act was superb in their own way, and I think the real magic of the Frogcast comes from the standard of talent its line-ups include.
Richard Massara’s doing a great thing; taking brilliant newer acts and not only letting them share the bill with seasoned professionals but also plugging their accolades and broadcasting it across the web for comedy-lovers to identify the future stars of comedy.
I spoke to Richard at one of the intervals to ask him what he was trying to create, to which he replied, ‘I want to make it a communal thing. I want to give acts a place to try out new stuff.’ It seems he’s trying to publicise the comedy community via his podcast, and in turn – after the night is allowed to grow and develop – he wants to have everything from sketch groups to acts trying out new, alternative material.
TV is cluttered with average talent whilst local comedy clubs are awash with top comics who are not getting the exposure – or the paid work – they deserve. This night showcases such talent and lets it not only flourish but sends it out to the masses for it to be processed on a national platform. Whilst the Frogcast’s structure can be a little loose at times, you can forgive that when you see the standard of acts on and allow for it to be cut down, edited and downloaded onto your iPod so you can walk around with a microcosm of vastly talented comedians throwing funnies into your fertile ears.
The next Frogcast will be on the 28th April and Chris Ramsey will be headlining. I’d highly recommend you come down for the show; if not, download the podcast here and keep supporting live comedy from the comfort of your own mp3 player.
