...to impress David Bowie

Robin Williams once offered to buy London’s influential Comic Strip comedy club – just so he could get more stage time to impress David Bowie.

The Hollywood star apparently made the offer to compere Alexei Sayle in the early 1980s when the night – staged in Soho’s seedy Raymond Revuebar –  was the epicentre of the alternative comedy boom.

Speaking to The Guardian, Comic Strip founder Peter Richardson recalls the night Williams showed up with Bowie in tow.

Sayle offered him a 15-minute slot, but that wasn’t good enough for the star, who responded: ‘I told [Bowie] I’d do an hour.’

When Sayle rejected his request, Williams responded: ‘I’ll buy the club!’ to which Sayle replied: ‘We don’t own it. It belongs to a bouffant-haired pornographer.’

Richardson opened The Comic Strip as a rival to the Comedy Store where he and other alternative comedy pioneers began. Its core company comprised The Outer Limits – the double act he performed with Nigel Planer – and Adrian Edmondson and Rik Mayall, plus e Sayle, who MCed and decided the running order, and Arnold Brown. Realising the gender imbalance, Richardson put out an advert for female performers which was answered by Dawn French and Jennifer Saunders.

Richardson was speaking to The Guardian to promote his Edinburgh Fringe shows looking back at the Comic Strip Presents shows the troupe made for Channel 4.

Published: 22 Jul 2025