The Alternative Comedy Experience
- TV stand-up
- Comedy Central
- 2013 - 2014
- 25 episodes (2 series)
Stewart Lee curates a series of stand-up nights featuring alternative comedians. Recorded for Comedy Central.
Press clippings
Behind the Scenes, The Alternative Comedy Experience
Four comedians talk about their experiences in The Alternative Comedy Experience, a recording of alternative Fringe Festival acts, put together by Stewart Lee.
Anglonerd, 4th July 2016The Alternative Comedy Experience, Series 2 review
The Alternative Comedy Experience is one of those programmes that reminds me of the reasons behind my love of comedy.
Becca Moody, Moody Comedy, 21st April 2015Stewart Lee axed: The demise of real stand-up
For stand-up, things are not looking so jolly. Last week Stewart Lee's The Alternative Comedy Experience was axed by Comedy Central. It is the only show I have seen that captures what club comedy really feels like - risky, sweaty, too intimate, teetering between hilarity and despair.
Alice Jones, The Independent, 19th March 2015Stewart Lee discusses Alternative Comedy Experience axe
Stewart Lee has discussed various subjects in a wide-ranging new interview, including the axing of his Comedy Central show The Alternative Comedy Experience.
British Comedy Guide, 12th March 2015Alternative Comedy Experience axed
The Alternative Comedy Experience has been cancelled says Stewart Lee.
Jay Richardson, Chortle, 9th March 2015Manchester comedy club threatened with legal action
North West comedy promoters Deadcat Comedy were contacted by a producer on Comedy Central's The Alternative Comedy Experience about their new comedy night, MACE. It was suggested that MACE, which stands for Manchester's Alternative Comedy Experience, was trading off their name - something organisers say they never intended.
Andrew Dipper, Giggle Beats, 3rd March 2015Stewart Lee interview
Known for his acerbic wit, 46-year-old writer, comedian, director, producer and musician Stewart Lee lives in London with his wife, fellow comedian Bridget Christie, and their two children.
Belfast Telegraph, 21st August 2014Radio Times review
As the title promises, these sessions from Edinburgh's Stand Comedy Club are the opposite of ordinary television comedy: rough around the edges, whimsical, occasionally controversial. This instalment is especially refreshing because it boasts an all-female line-up. Familiar faces Bridget Christie and Josie Long are joined by Maeve Higgins who has novel ideas about exercise, Helen Keen on modern relationships and self-professed "geek songstress" Helen Arney performing a surreal ode to the sun. Christie fans should tune in purely for her energetic tirade about Stirling Moss.
Claire Webbb, Radio Times, 19th August 2014The Alternative Comedy Experience - TV review
A refreshing comedy experience where women can stand up and be counted.
Ellen E. Jones, The Independent, 30th July 2014Stewart Lee's Alternative Comedy Experience offers 25 minutes of understated joy over on Comedy Central. Now three episodes into its second series, it's a grottier, grimier Live At The Apollo, without the necessary blockbuster blandness of John Bishop or Michael McIntyre.
Lee talks to comedians about their comedy - more interesting than it sounds, because of the calibre of people involved - which is then interspersed with short excerpts from stand-up sets, filmed at Edinburgh's tiny pub-like venue The Stand, giving it a brilliantly raucous, ramshackle feel.
Tuesday's episode saw Susan Calman, Josie Long, Kevin Eldon and David O'Doherty performing, with O'Doherty - a particular delight. If you've ever wondered how someone can do witty nostalgia about long-dead technology without sounding like a Buzzfeed list, then track O'Doherty's set down as a matter of urgency.
Rebecca Nicholson, The Guardian, 30th July 2014