Image credit: Andre Patten

Returning to the Edinburgh Fringe for his 32nd year, award-winning comedian and climate speaker Stuart Goldsmith brings his latest show, Canary, to the festival. His work exploring the climate crisis through comedy has been featured widely across press and media outlets including BBC Radio, BBC News, Radio Times and more.

Stuart Goldsmith’s second hour of climate comedy explores how to turn fear into something useful, finding humour in a difficult subject. We caught up with Stuart ahead of the festival to find out more.

Every show begins with an initial spark. What was the original idea, moment or experience that made you create this piece?
I can’t choose one. The sparks include: explaining the climate crisis to my kids; clutching at straws to cheer my wife up when I’ve overdone it on the doom; scaring a friend who asked if we needed to be worried about our children; the 2022 heatwaves that killed nearly 3000 people, and a bit I’ve been fiddling with for years about going mad in a forest.

What can audiences expect when they step into this world?
They can expect me to crease them up laughing, somehow whilst talking about a scary and complex subject which implicates all of us.

The Edinburgh Fringe is a place where artists and audiences come together from across the world. Why is this the right place for this show?
I’ve been coming to the fringe since the nineties, but two years ago my brother came up and he looked around and said “oh i get it – it’s a trying-things festival”. That absolutely nails what I love about it.

What is something about the show that the audience might not immediately notice, but you hope they discover?
That I have actually read a few books. Well, started them.

What has surprised you most about creating this piece?
That swinging wildly between hope and despair is a completely reasonable reaction to a climate polycrisis, but that there is far more hope out there than I’d realised, and it all starts with giving yourself permission to grapple with it all.

When your audience walks home, what would you love them to still be talking about?
My mission for this one is that when your friend confides in you that they went down a climate rabbit hole online and they’re completely freaking out, you can say to them “go and see Stuart Goldsmith, he’ll sort you out.”

Stuart Goldsmith: Canary
Monkey Barrel, Cabaret Voltaire
14:25
17th – 30th August