Rik Caranza - Charming ****

I've mentioned Rik Caranza before in my blog. He's been around the comedy scene in Edinburgh for a while now. I must have seen him for the first time around seven years ago, upstairs at the Beehive on a random Saturday night out with the Fringe.

Back then he was a open spot with some funny lines about his ethnicity and weight and a likeable manner and he built on that when I saw him at the Laughing Horse new act competition a couple of times, standing out from the crowd as the most polished of the Edinburgh open spots and progressing to the next stage of the competition.

Later he added music to his repertoire and this year, for the first time, I saw him displaying some comedy sketch drawings, which were probably one of my highlights of the show. (Fortunately he can't do the fat jokes any more because he's slimmed down a fair bit).

This year, Caranza is assisted by Des O'Gorman, another Edinburgh based stand up comedian and actor (originally from Ireland), who I wouldn't stay stole the show, but some of the the best bits were when the two of them were working together, especially when O'Gorman burst back into the room in costume (I won't say who he was dressed as) for a film related sketch.

I saw O'Gorman in Globophobia last year and he definitely did steal the show in that one, so I should probably mention that he is doing a solo show this year too.

But the majority of the show concentrated on Rik and the word "charming" which was used to describe him in several reviews last year. Rik wanted to know, was he charming in a good way (Will Smith) or a bad way (Hugh Grant) and had a sliding scale which the audience were allowed to move depending on his material and general demeanour.

I won't tell you where he ended up on the charming scale, nor can I predict where he'll end up in his comedy career. I know he doesn't do stand up comedy full time (despite faring much better than a lot of full time comics that I've seen).

If he doesn't go down the full time route, he'll have many more good nights for years to come at the Free Festival and he'll become even more well known on the circuit in Edinburgh and Scotland. If he does go full time, his sense of timing, good choice of subject matter, and yes his charm, could see him going even further than that.