Alexander Larman
I am a great believer that there should be no unbroachable topic in comedy, as long as the person broaching it does so in a funny enough fashion. This, however, does not mean that this person should always be entitled to do so. Had Jimmy Savile launched into a new stand-up career eulogising the joys of paedophilia and necrophilia, I am not sure that he would have been playing to enthusiastic audiences, no matter how good the jokes, and while Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor proved to be inadvertently hilarious while discussing everything from Pizza Express to sweating on Newsnight, I am not sure he would be cheered to the rafters at an open-mic night at his local Jongleurs.
I think we can add Amanda Knox to the ranks of those who should not be performing comedy, but unfortunately visitors to Edinburgh this year are being offered the American’s first stand-up show. Named Cartwheel, after the antics that she allegedly performed when she was first accused of her friend Meredith Kercher’s murder in Italy in 2007 – she said she did the splits instead – Knox is said to see the show as being ‘inspirational’, rather than simply cynical. She commented that ‘It is about acknowledging that bad things happen in life which will turn you upside down. But it’s also about not letting that arrest your momentum because the only way you can land on your feet is through those difficult experiences.’
