Former teacher does her homework ahead of gig

HONK! Henley has come up with a scrummy evening, in the form of a night of comedy at Henley Rugby Club tonight (Friday).

For Comedy @ the Club, up-and-coming Marlow comedian Sophie White will compère, while on the bill are deadpan television stalwart Arthur Smith, Smack the Pony member Fiona Allen and Edinburgh Fringe sell-out, Hasan Al-Habib.

The evening will comprise a two-course dinner and auction, followed by a night of stand-up entertainment.

Sophie says: “It’s actually my first time properly doing the emceeing and compèring so I really hope I don’t mess it up!

“Tom is so lovely, I’m just really excited to have been given the chance to do it really.”

Having lived in London and Surrey, Sophie has come back to her roots.

“I grew up in Marlow and then disappeared to a various places for a couple of years and then I have actually ended up coming back — in spite of what I probably have dared to believe when I was a teenager,” she says.

The 34-year-old ventured into the world of stand-up comedy last year.

“I did a course as a challenge to myself and I have recently come back, I’ve just moved back to Marlow and started working at the brewery.

“It was the first time that I had ever had a semblance of work-life balance so I thought I would start a hobby and did this course.

“I just became obsessed immediately. I wasn’t the funniest person on the course by any means but I definitely felt, oh my goodness me, this is something that I can’t imagine not doing now and it just went from there.”

She says her jokes are mostly anecdotal and she gets to mine the rich seams of her previous careers. “I used to work in the film industry and then I was a teacher for three years and then I ended up moving back. So it’s all been a bit higgledy-piggledy.

“At the moment I’m doing quite a lot of husband-hunting material, that seems to be a main theme. But it’s definitely not a coincidence that lots of comedians have trodden the path of being a teacher, that is an endless source.”

Sophie is on the open-mic circuit but will be going to the Edinburgh Fringe later this summer.

“A friend of mine called Sam Hampson, we’ve just taken a two-hander show called Is This It? to the Brighton Fringe, which we’re looking forward to taking to Edinburgh as part of the PBH’s Free Fringe this year. That went down brilliantly. We were really pleased, we sold out our run when we were there, so we’re really chuffed with that.”

In the meantime, she says she has been doing her “homework” on her co-stars for tonight’s bill.

“It’s an absolute privilege to be able to do it, it’s a really cool line-up and I’m going to have massive impostor syndrome on the night.

“I think Tom says I’ve got 10 minutes. I’ll do that and then introduce everybody.

“He did also say they’re doing an auction and he asked if I’d be up for doing it but I really do not have a head for numbers.

“I’ve said I might leave that one, because literally at work the other day I told somebody that their purchase came to quarter past four, rather than £16.15, so I think I’m going to leave the numbers to someone else.

“I was so embarrassed, but luckily I have a lovely team that I work with and they’ve come to understand that numeracy is not where my skillset lies!”

A popular man for television voiceovers and a Radio 2 presenter, Arthur Smith is a veteran with a dry sense of humour and deadpan delivery, who has been on the alternative comedy circuit since the Eighties.

Fiona Allen, who lives in Bray, Maidenhead, turned to stand-up in her 50s, having worked in television while raising her family.

Hasan Al-Habib’s double-act show 2 Muslim 2 Furious, with Aisha Amanduri, sold out at last year’s Edinburgh Fringe. His first solo show earlier this year was called Death to the West (Midlands), an ode to his Iraqi heritage and being brought up in Birmingham.

l Comedy @ the Club is at Henley Rugby Club tonight (Friday) at 7.30pm (doors open at 7pm). Tickets cost £45. For more information, visit linktr.ee/honkhot