This site uses cookies to improve your experience and to provide services and advertising.
By continuing to browse, you agree to the use of cookies described in our Cookies Policy.
You may change your settings at any time but this may impact on the functionality of the site.
To learn more see our
Cookies Policy.
Download our app
Meet Ruth Hunter, the 'human woman from Dublin' who is the next big thing in Irish comedy
LAST YEAR, IRISH comedian Ruth Hunter came second in So You Think You’re Funny, a renowned stand-up comedy competition that’s been held in Edinburgh every year since 1988.
To put that achivement in perspective, comedians to previously finish in second and third place at So You Think You’re Funny include Alan Carr, Nina Conti, Sarah Millican, Russell Kane, Seann Walsh and Rob Beckett.
Indeed, the competition has helped launch the careers of many notable Irish comedians including Tommy Tiernan, Aisling Bea and David O’Doherty.
“It still seems unreal,” Hunter tells DailyEdge.ie. “Just one of many traumatic events of 2016.”
Whoops!
We couldn't find this Tweet
Hunter is a self-described “human woman from Dublin”. By day, she’s a “staying afloat day-job worker” in a “non-specific government office” who moonlights as a comedian and writer on the side.
Hunter started performing stand-up in the summer of 2015 and has quickly established herself as one of the most exciting, unique comedians working in Ireland.
She cites the likes of Eddie Izzard, Dylan Moran, Mitch Hedberg and Steven Wright as among her influences. If Hunter has anything in common with those comedy luminaries, it’s her onstage presence.
She’s less Live At The Apollo, more dour and deadpan.
This weekend, Hunter is joining forces with Conor O’Toole to start a new stand-up comedy club in The Workman’s called, aptly enough, Workman’s Comedy Club.
At present, they have scheduled and programmed six gigs with new and exciting stand-up comedians from home and abroad, including last year’s So You Think You’re Funny champion Heidi Regan.
This is not Hunter’s first foray into hosting a comedy night of her own. She previously ran a comedy/music/spoken word night called Kill The Winter.
Workman’s Comedy Club was born out of a desire to offer a regular night devoted to up-and-comers with a slightly different sensibility.
Hunter says that she finds the Dublin comedy scene to be “fine” but lacking in comparison to our neighbours across the pond.
“What’s missing in Dublin is a diversity of cliques,” she explains. “In terms of organisers, promoters and bookers it is also a very male-dominated platform.”
Indeed Workman’s Comedy Club is already to be commended for the healthy number of female comedians on their bill — 11 in total.
Among other things, Hunter is also a feminist and last year, she devised a very funny series of “feminist coping cards” designed to be handed out during particularly trying conversations.
Hunter explained that she was inspired to make them after a night out in which her friend, who worked for a charity addressing violence against the LGBT community, was accused by a man of not having a “real job”.
Ruth O'Kelly Hunter Ruth O'Kelly Hunter
*shoves into purse immediately*
So what’s next for Hunter? You’ll be able to see her gigging in Dublin and Galway, and she is planning on taking a show to Edinburgh Festival in August with her partner-in-crime Conor O’Toole.
Fancy catching her before she becomes the next big thing? You can see her in Workman’s Comedy Club this Sunday.
DailyEdge is on Snapchat! Tap the button below to add!
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
chats funny girl ruth hunter