What a weekend. I had hoped the Cat Laughs festival would live up to expectations but it was so much more than that. I travelled down on the Saturday after a slight mishap with the bus and met with Darren and Liz who gave me a lift out to Darragh‘s place in Graiguenamangh. I’d be staying there the weekend and thankfully the weather was gorgeous throughout. A special mention to Darragh’s parents who were lovely people and excellent hosts.
After lounging around in the garden (swinging chair ftw) for a while we made for the city again. After parking up the car we retired to what was described as a ‘dinky bar’ (Morrisons) and sat in the opened window to watch the throngs pass by. Pints lead to burgers which, in turn lead to the International Improv gig in the Watergate. It was the first improv show that I’d seen and it was excellent. The players – Ian Coppinger, Michelle Read, Paul Tylak, Brendan Hunt and Michael Orton Toliver – provided 90 minutes of hilarity including highlights like the gynapuncturist and superhero killer (during the ‘guess what i do game’).
The River Court hotel provided a nice venue to digest the gig (in joke: and take fishy photos) after which we split for the taxi rank. A monster queue meant we ended up going to the after party with the comedians. We met {namedrop}Des Bishop, Jason Byrne, Colin Murphy, Brendan Hunt and Michael Orton Toliver{/namedrop}. Experiencing Des’ Leim Thart performance was a highlight (clip embedded below) and the night came to an end at 5.15am with a foggy taxi journey back to Graiguenamangh.
The post covering Sunday will follow. Hoping to get a few more photos to post as well.
4 replies on “Cat Laughs – The Saturday Night”
Brilliant! I’ll try get my posts up today (so busy). Here’s Lottie’s video of Des Bishop.
I was firmly planted at the front of the stage for that one. The place went mental altogether.
@Darren: Cool. Liz’s video is great. Love the way you can watch it in higher res.
@Ken McGuire: It was fantastic alright.
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