Sold Out at Alice Park Cafe: How Our Outdoor Comedy Night Went Down

The Jesters took itself out of Alfred Street last night and into Alice Park, for a comedy night that was, by any measure, a very odd and very good idea. Sold out.

A comedy club in a park after dark

There's something properly strange about watching stand-up comedy under Alice Park Cafe's outdoor gazebo as the light goes. No proper stage, no low ceiling, just a mic, a parasol overhead and rows of chairs packed in under the bunting. Jarred Christmas got there before anyone else, joking about performing in a space with no walls at all. It's the kind of setup that could go wrong in about six different ways. Instead it turned into one of the best nights the club has put on.

The line-up

Sam Hawkins MC'd. Emma Hughes opened. Ollie Young and Jess Lo held the middle. Jarred Christmas headlined, and did what he does best: an unreasonably accurate tour through regional UK accents that had the whole park in stitches.

The crowd

Sold out, and a proper mixed bag of a crowd. Northerners a long way from home, an actual endocrinologist, and at least one child who seemed to be having the best night of anyone there. Everyone sat there laughing as the sun went down, which is not a sentence Bath comedy usually gets to use.

Fed and watered

Alice Park Cafe kept the food and drink coming all evening. Big thanks to Tony and the team there, who did a proper job of keeping a sold-out crowd fed in a park with no kitchen to speak of.

More of this, please

It went well enough that a one-off has turned into a plan. The Jesters is putting together a full series of outdoor events at Alice Park Cafe, running from spring next year, with a possible Christmas special thrown in for anyone brave enough to sit outside in December. Wrap up warm for that one!