The Story of Medieval England From 1066 to 1485 at Roughly Nine Years and Two Jokes Per Minute Incorporating The Hundred Years War as a Football Match and of Course Scottish Independence Performed by Paul B Edwards – Free

The Story of Medieval England From 1066 to 1485 at Roughly Nine Years and Two Jokes Per Minute Incorporating The Hundred Years War as a Football Match and of Course Scottish Independence or as the staff of Bannerman’s Bar paraphrased on their chalkboard, Medieval Bollocks, is essentially titular. Performed by the pleasantly moustachioed, chain mail wearing Paul B Edwards, Medieval England is an hour long history lecture punctuated by a fair number of jokes and the occasional catch phrase.

Despite not successfully hitting every single punchline and the rather strange smell present in the Bannerman’s back room, the show was quite good.

The show will primarily appeal to two types of people. History fans and supporters of dad jokes. Fortunately for history fans and despite the frantic pace and occasional musical interludes, the amount of memorable fact nuggets was actually rather large. The most notable revelation being that Richard the Lion Heart was not only killed by a young boy armed only with a crossbow and frying pan, but that Richard pardoned the child from his deathbed and sent him away with 100 shillings.

Aware of the target demographic a show about medieval history was likely to attract, Edwards conceded that “a lot of this is old people jokes.” For the most part he was right, references to Course you can Malcolm flying right over this reviewers youthful head. That does not mean however, that the jokes were not good. Promising not to mention religion again for another 106 years only to mumble of “it’s all made up anyway” procured almost as many laughs as the audience interaction segment; this evening, the coaxed shouting of “Oh me Barons” on the occasion of every clergy led revolt. Less laughs but more humour could be found following a somewhat bitter story about his ex-wife.

Despite not successfully hitting every single punchline and the rather strange smell present in the Bannerman’s back room, the show was quite good. Certainly not groundbreaking and most definitely directed towards a slightly older audience, but really quite good.