Spitting, rites of passage and lurve. Murphy's Cat Laughs Comedy Festival in Kilkenny has it all. Three young local boys sit in the front row of the National Craft Gallery. They've come to see the performance of Johnny Vegas, former potter and current hot-shot comedian. "What are you doing here?" he challenges them. "Did no one warn you? You come in here as boys, you leave as men."
Brain McPartlan (12) and his two younger brothers, Colin (9) and Robbie (10) are nonplussed. "Spit on me," urges the ceramic contender, "the ceramacist who dares to challenge". "Go on, I dare you," he says, hoiking up a mouthful of spittle, holding the microphone close so we can all enjoy the music of mucus. Vegas is about to sit at the potter's wheel. "I am holding the breasts of mother earth in my hands," he says as he takes the clay. Ah, he sighs: "The hands of a woman and the desires of a man."
On a romantic note, Ed Byrne, the long-haired Dublin comedian, is equally brilliant on stage, but he remains mum about his new girlfriend, well-known Letitia Dean, who plays the blond barmaid, Sharon Watts, in EastEnders. The two met at the recent British Soap Awards in London and friends say he's in love.