Oliver Double
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Oliver Double | |
|---|---|
 Oliver Double in 2022 | |
| Born | 22 May 1965 |
| Academic work | |
| Discipline | Arts |
| Sub-discipline | Comedy and Popular Performance |
| Institutions | University of Kent |
| Notable works | Stand-Up! On Being a Comedian (1997), Alternative Comedy: 1979 and the Reinvention of British Stand-Up. (2020) |
Oliver Double (born 22 April 1965)[citation needed] is a British stand-up comedian, author and academic. Since 1999, he has taught comic and popular performance at the University of Kent.[1] His current roles at the university are Reader in Drama and Theatre, and Head of Comedy and Popular Performance.[2][3]
Double worked as a circuit comedian and founded the Last Laugh comedy club in Sheffield.[4] He continues to perform in his one-person shows Saint Pancreas[5] and Break a Leg and in a monthly comedy club called Funny Rabbit.[6]
He has written books on the subject including 1997's Stand Up![7] and 2012's Britain Had Talent[8] as well as book chapters and articles about stand-up comedy, alternative comedy,[9][10][11] variety theatre and vaudeville[12]
Double contributed to the creation of the British Stand-Up Comedy Archive (BSUCA) at Kent University's Templeman Library[13][14] and he produced a monthly podcast about BSUCA called A History of Comedy in Several Objects.[15][16]
He has appeared on TV programmes and documentaries discussing stand-up comedy, including BBC's Imagine and Horizon.[17] He has also appeared on numerous comedy podcasts including The Alexei Sayle Podcast where he discussed Bertolt Brecht[18] and Book Shambles where he discussed the history alternative comedy with Josie Long and Robin Ince.[18]
Double teaches practical performance[19] including stand-up comedy[20] based on research and many of his students have become professional comedians.[12]
Books
- Stand-Up! On Being a Comedian (1997, Methuen Drama) ISBN 9780413703200
- Getting the Joke: The Inner Workings of Stand-Up Comedy (2004, Bloomsbury) ISBN 978-0413774767
- Britain Had Talent: A History of Variety Theatre (2012, Palgrave Macmillan) ISBN 978-0230284609
- Alternative Comedy: 1979 and the Reinvention of British Stand-Up (2020, Bloomsbury) ISBN 9781350052819