Comics' benefit for their ill manager

A bunch of comedians is staging a charity gig to help pay the medical expenses of their former agent.

The event will raise funds for Beth O’Brien, who was forced to wind down her company Ditto Productions last year because of ill health.

Now her clients are helping raise money to pay for cutting-edge treatments at Stanford Medical School's state-of-the-art autoimmune clinic in California.

The BethFest gig, at the Bill Murray in North London, will feature the creators of Dara O’Briain’s Go 8 Bit, McNeil & Pamphilon, sketch teams Lazy Susan,   The Beta Males and Sad Faces, and comics Megan Ford and Jay Foreman. 

It will be hosted by Jim Campbell and Bec Hill, who organised the event and said in a statement: ‘Beth O'Brien worked tirelessly for all of the acts on this bill, as well as many more, through her agency, Ditto Productions.

‘Sadly, she had to close Ditto down as a result of ill health and now needs treatment in the US. We figured that the best way to help would be to raise some money by doing what we do best, and though it's tempting to take somewhere between 10 and 15 per cent of the final total we'll probably even give her the whole lot.’

Writing on Facebook, O’Brien said: ‘I’m the luckiest one to be surrounded by these people.’

As well as looking after her own clients, O’Brien is probably best known in comedy circles for co-producing The Wrestling spectaculars at the Edinburgh Fringe.

None of the comedians involved in her benefit submitted their promotional photos to Hill and Campbell as requested, so the pair went through Facebook to find their least flattering photos to make this poster:

Tickets for the February 28 gig are available here.

Published: 26 Jan 2017