Brighton’s about to get even louder: the Brighton Dome Comedy Festival is back this October with ten days of stand-up, sketch shenanigans and cult comedy from some of the biggest and most fabulously weird names in the game.
Richard Ayoade’s one of the headliners, bringing his dry-as-dust genius to the Dome with an intro to his new book, Afterthoughts, a deep dive into his most ridiculous ideas. Other big names include Romesh Ranganathan and Tom Davis, who are bringing their hit podcast The Wolf and Owl on tour, while Ed Gamble and Lucy Beaumont are topping a special festival edition of comedy showcase Live at Brighton Dome.
You can expect a whole cavalcade of heavy hitters this year: Rosie Jones, Babatunde Aléshé, Chris McCausland, Jen Brister, Josie Long, Nick Helm, Rob Newman, Suzi Ruffell and improv icons Paul Merton and Suki Webster. There’s even a one-off mix of music and mischief from Boothby Graffoe and guitarist Antonio Forcione.
Meanwhile, the Studio Theatre next door is getting a solid dose of Edinburgh weirdness: Siblings are bringing their gloriously unhinged Dreamweavers, ventriloquist-clown Lachlan Werner is blurring genres in WonderTwunk, and Lou Wall’s meme-powered Breaking the Fifth Wall promises “silly and profound” stand-up that’ll melt your brain in the best possible way. And there’s more: Lily Phillips is back with her new show Crying, while Lucy Pearman is channelling moon-mad energy in Lunartic.
All shows are live-captioned as part of Dome’s push for proper accessibility, and most of the big-name nights still have tickets left – for now – but we’d recommend not hanging around too long if you’ve got some must-see names on your list.
Friday 17th – Sunday 26th October; various times and prices
brightondome.org
