Tom Adams and Laura Mugridge’s Bookish

Award-winning performers Tom Adams and Laura Mugridge have teamed up to present ‘Bookish’. The idea is that the audience choose which two books they’ll talk about… and the people of Harrogate chose The Dairy Book of Family Cookery and Tales of The Unexpected –by Roald Dahl.

The first half of the show was nothing to do with books, mainly given that the ‘book’ in question was a recipe book. It was a very cheese-heavy hour but, with plenty of audience participation (some of it not asked for but beautifully handled) the evening flew by. The wine and cheese given to the audience probably helped. Okay, definitely helped. One major disappointment is that the duo performed ‘Sweet Dreams’ with no cheese puns included! I did like the cute and particularly random songs dotted about (‘Amazon Reviews’ is particularly clever), though both Adams and Mugridge are very good performers and their high skill level detracts from the humour a little as it’s easy to view them a bit too seriously.

The second half was a little more bookish, though the pair do go off on tangents. I’d class the show as a great night out for the comedy enthusiasts… not so much for the literary lovers.

Both performers are extremely funny if their dry sense of humour and sometimes so-bad-it’s-good jokes are all intentional. If the audience were more receptive, I think it would have pulled off a lot better.

Fair play to both performers for getting straight off the train in Harrogate and on to the stage with no prep due to travel issues. It showed great professionalism that will no doubt serve them incredibly well throughout the tour of ‘Bookish’.

See more about the tour here.