Comedy Club hosts British counterparts
British stand-up comedians meet their Greek counterparts this month at the Comedy Club in a novel venture by the club and the British Council. Three stars of the UK scene – Craig Hill, Lucy Porter and Owen O’Neill – will sharpen their wits on Athenian audiences alongside the Comedy Club team. Stand-up comedy is fairly new in Greece and still an amateur enterprise. Hill told the press yesterday how surprised his Greek colleagues were that he made a living from it. The visitors will run workshops for the local comedians. «Of course I expect to learn something too,» said Hill. «We feel rather alone in what we’re doing,» said Lucia Rikaki of the Comedy Club, «and this is an opportunity to share it with professionals from the UK.» It will also be a chance to see how humor travels. Hill certainly raised a laugh with his response to the Evzones, the presidential guard whose uniform dates from the time of King Otto. «It’s surprising to see men who look so butch wearing tights,» he said. «I wanted to touch them but the guard said he’d shoot me if I did.» He relished the opportunity to leave the «comfort zone» of the familiar and work in new places «where you have to establish a relationship with an audience within two minutes.» Hill appears tonight and tomorrow night with a clutch of Greek comedians. 48-50 Aeolou, near Monastiraki metro station, at 10 p.m. from Wednesday-Sunday. Advance booking essential.
