Review by Steve Bennett

With his work on BBC Scotland and his trademark exuberant bitchiness Hill is never short of an Edinburgh crowd, each August his faithful following are guaranteed to be in attendance.

Performing in the ballroom at the Assembly Rooms for the second time (so gleeful was he at his show's venue last year it was entitled Craig Hill's Got The Ballroom) you can't help but suspect that the chandelier, velvet and deep red lighting décor is how he's got his own pad decked out.

Starting as he means to go on, the adrenalin pounds as Hill leaps on to the stage and lip synchs to Madonna's Hung Up swinging his black rubber kilt as he goes. 'Every year I get older and that dance gets pooffier,' he announces breathlessly. He then spends the next ten minutes teasing the front row, any rogue latecomers and Neil Hamilton who he discovers in the crowd too.

With a deep breath it's into the material; beginning with how it feels to be wearing a kilt in the traditional manner, his unlikely work experience of teaching sex education in schools and how gay marriage means there surely will be some magnificent gay divorces too. What follows is basically a cutting tongue catch up on Hill's year including a gig in Greece, fanciable plumbers and visiting America.

The show is loosely pieced together with no real attempt at a theme (does he really need one?) though are some tenuous links between subjects that he successfully glosses over. Another hi-energy, fun-filled hour from the cattiest cat on the circuit.

Marissa Burgess

Review date: 1 Jan 2006
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett