Celeste Dring

28 of the best comedy shows at the Fringe

We took a look at the huge lineup of comedy gear at this year's Edinburgh Festival Fringe and selected a sample of the shows that are already tickling our tickly bits.

Fringe: The best comedy shows to see

If the London previews have tickled your fancy and you've made the decision to go up to Edinburgh, you're bound to be looking for some lols.

Fringe Q&As: Lazy Susan

Lazy Susan are performing Forgive Me, Mother! at the Assembly: The Box during August.

Stars join Edinburgh Fringe Prom Nht

Comedy duo Max and Ivan have added six more of Edinburgh's finest acts to their stellar line-up of comedians taking part in this year's epic Festival finale.

The Windsors Royal Wedding Special review

Bert Tyler-Moore and George Jeffrie's ruthless comedy is a reminder that you can get away with a lot as long as you are funny.

TV Review, This Country (BBC1, BBC3)

Painfully brilliant allegory for Brexit Britain.

On late at night and just 15 minutes long, this is an out-and-out mickey-take of Serial-type shows. Two US journalists, sisters Jenna (Freya Parker) and Dana (Celeste Dring) - complete with up-speak at the end of their sentences and NPR vocal fry - are employed by Eric Sass, "MC, host, story connoisseur" (David Elms), to report on interesting tales from the UK. They decide to investigate the goings-on of two other sisters, Gilly and Sally. Gilly and Sally are elderly English aristocrats and thus utterly eccentric, especially Gilly. Gilly's fond of shooting, shouting and, well, shagging and drugs. Jenna and Dana fulfil everything you might expect from Serial-style hosts: they insert themselves into the story, have moments of self-doubt, and describe the main characters swiftly and emotively. "Sally has a sweet, round red face," says Jenna. "Kind of like an apple in a wig." The joy of this show is partly in the silliness, but mostly in the spoofing. As a big US podcast fan I loved it.

A day on the set of This Country

Sick of working odd jobs just to survive, Daisy May Cooper hounded production companies with a short sketch about Kerry, the lead character in the now critically acclaimed comedy. Sean O'Grady dusts off his acting skills and joins the actress and her brother on set.

Ellie White & Celeste Dring on The Windsors

An interview with Ellie White, who plays Princess Beatrice, and her on-screen sister Celeste Dring, who plays Princess Eugenie.

The Windsors are back on our box, welcomely, and still happily unfettered by such restrictive critical considerations as, for instance, taste. The satirical royal soap takes a blunderbuss approach to its humour: precisely how sharp might you have to be to take the rip out of Charles's ineffectuality or Theresa May's bullying incompetence? But the delights arrive with the minor royals: a vicious Pippa, casting gypsy curses, or Beatrice and Eugenie (Celeste Dring and Ellie White), mangling every posh diphthong available into a gargoyled simulacrum of the English language and thus gently, gleefully, reminding us of that old head-scratching question: what are they all, y'know, for?