Katherine Ryan

News Shopper: Just For Laughs has been launching and championing top comedic talent for almost 40 years - from Jerry Seinfeld to Kevin Hart, Amy Schumer to Ali ...

The Just For Laughs festival was a great Thursday treat, and I can’t wait to return next year. The last ‘friend’ to take to the stage was Ed Gamble - his jokes were both robust and piercingly funny, and the audience were quite literally howling at every word he said, including me. Between each act, Katherine would pop in to make sure the audience were still oozing over the previous jokes and would then continue to say even more wittier things – it was a great way to break up the performers. “I need that outfit”, I said to my friend as we watched her enthusiastically open the show and introduce the “friends” for the evening. Alike her character in The Duchess, Katherine is a fashionable icon, and she took to the stage at 9.30pm sharp, wearing a lilac sequinned suit, cuffed with purple feathers. When I saw she was performing at the Just For Laughs festival, I thought this would be my one chance to get “stuck-in” and see if she was as funny in person as she is on the TV.