School Night joins the ranks of late night, best of the fest numbers at Pleasance Courtyard, the setup being the audience are the pupils and the comedians the teachers, all there to educate you in a certain subject. Sadly, this setup is a thin veil for a rather standard run around of short promotional sets. One comedian did embrace his subject, PE, and using the audience, mostly without talking, showed us all how to play golf. If the other acts had considered their classes a little more and created something relevant this evening event would have a slight advantage over other variety shows. However, what was on display on the night I attended was mediocre. From the desperately clawing (Sociology with an observational humorist) to the desperately far-flung (Science with some superhero based sketches from The Beta Males), this evening lacked commitment to its central clause and this lead to nothing more than a standard evening with a fancy title.
Comperé and headteacher Stuart Goldsmith embraced his new role with a boyish delight, calling everyone by their surnames, and telling off late comers; he held the concept together as best as he could. Strangely, though his commitment to the show premise seemed to be completely abandoned when he came to his own slot, it was his solo show that I was the most intrigued to seek out once class had ended. Hopefully the guests at future shows will do the same as Golding and worry about the night at hand rather than future sales, but for now it's a C- and a 'could try harder'.
