Film / News
Slapstick January gala details revealed
Grey, gloomy January may seem a long way off right now but, trust us on this, you’ll need some serious New Year perking up. So why not plan ahead by bagging tickets for the Slapstick Festival‘s 13th annual mirth-filled Silent Comedy Gala at the Colston Hall on Friday 20 January? These have just go on sale, and are very reasonably priced from £10.75 (under 12s) to £27, with no additional rip-off booking fee bollocks.
The gala’s centrepiece is a full screening of the restoration of the original campus comedy: Harold Lloyd’s The Freshman from 1925. One of the biggest hits of the silent era, this casts Lloyd in his familiar bespectacled nerd persona as a young student who attempts to achieve popularity – and win the heart of the lovely Jobyna Ralston – by joining the college football team. It was among the first films to be selected for preservation in the US National Film Registry for being “culturally, historically or aesthetically significant.”
is needed now More than ever
The screening will be accompanied by Carl Davis’s score, performed live by the 25-piece Bristol Ensemble conducted by Slapstick regular Guenter A. Buchwald. Your gala host is impressionist and comedian Rory Bremner, whose association with Slapstick goes back to the 2012 Stand Up for Slapstick fundraiser. He’ll also be introducing classic comedy shorts from Laurel and Hardy (The Finishing Touch) and Buster Keaton (The High Sign).
There’s more Bremner in Slapstick’s Feast of Fun fundraiser at the Colston Hall on September 29, when he’ll be joined by Neil Innes, Barry Cryer and – making his only live solo performance of the year in Bristol – the great John Cleese. This comes a fortnight after the Stand Up for Slapstick show at the same venue on September 15, featuring Jack Dee, Susan Calman, Jason Manford and Richard Herring. These fundraisers are vital for Slapstick’s finances, as Festival Director Chris Daniels explains: “Previously, we’ve managed to supplement our very healthy ticket sales income with just one big fund-raiser a year but we are really struggling with the budget for Slapstick 2017, not least because many of our regular venues are having to up their charges to us, in order to make their own books balance.”
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