comedy feature

The fringe is an Utter! experience

Tom Peel has a word with the ringmaster of spoken word, Richard Tyrone Jones

Comedy, musicals, dance, opera and street acts are all performance arts that the average Fringe adventurer has always expected to see in abundance. One art form, however, has only really begun to make a niche for itself at the Festival in the last few years, and it’s a development that ThreeWeeks have long been keeping an interested eye on.

This year, spoken word at the Fringe takes a step up, however, with the arrival of ‘Utter’. It’s a regular event that Richard Tyrone Jones has been running on the London circuit for the last five years, and now he’s bringing his showcase - one of the capital’s top spoken word nights – to “one of the most poetic countries in the world” with a view to reaching a wider, non-London audience, and to tap into the talent of Scotland.

And tap he will, given his plans for a variety of differently themed shows, which include an ‘Utter! Scots’ night - “because often Scots feel like us Sassenachs are invading for a month so we’re showcasing talented local bards” - as well as a ‘Donut Night’, which will see John Hegley, Tim Wells and Tim Turnbull reading from their recent collections released by independent poetry publisher Donut Press, accompanied by “a Cool Hand Luke-style doughnut eating competition”. There’s also the ‘Utter! Dead Poets & Puppets Society’, night, where Jones himself will “channel the spirit of Ted Hughes for the Sylvia Plath story... with puppets”; he promises that this latter show is “not in as poor taste as you might imagine!”

Why, though, has it taken five years for ‘Utter!’ to make its way to the largest arts festival on the planet? And why is now a good time to take the plunge? Is it because there are now more poets getting in on the Fringe act these days, or is poetry in general undergoing something of a revival?

“The quality’s always been there”, Richard explains. “But now it’s getting press thanks to lively nights like ‘Utter!’, Luke Wright and his Latitude festival stage, and acts like Scroobius Pip, PoeJazzi and MC Dockers, some of whom have beards, but don’t mumble into them. Festivals are open-minded enough to put poets on alongside top name comedians, authors and musical acts, and so am I. In ten years, I’ll fill Wembley with spoken word acts. Wembley Social Club, that is.”

He also rightly suggests Edinburgh is the perfect pitching ground for less-mainstream performance types due to the open-mindedness of the audience. “An Edinburgh audience is up for comedy, music, cabaret, puppetry, all in one day,” he says. “And at ‘Utter!’ they’ll get a bit of each in one hour, in poetic form, often from the same act.”

It seems then, that if you bore of your standard comedy and theatre itinerary and fancy something a bit more unusual, you should venture down to the dark recesses of Fingers Piano Bar because, as Jones states, “Edinburgh should expect the unexpected from us, as well as poetry with a good sense of humour, and humour with a poetic sensibility.”


Utter! Spoken Word, Utter!/PBH’s Free Fringe, Fingers Piano Bar, 8-29 August, 17.30 (18.30), Free non-ticketed, fpp 108.

published: Aug-2009

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