It’s a weird age, isn’t it, 30? Your parents were married with kids, while you’re still figuring it out. At this year’s Fringe, several comedians are trying to navigate their own place along that spectrum.
Comedians James Trickey and Ted Milligan are debuting their sketch hour Burger and a Pint: Treats for the Soul, which is about “getting older without quite feeling like you have.” But where does that feeling come from?
Neither one of them feels like they’ve aged a day since they met at university, and yet as they look around at friends and former classmates getting engaged, say, or getting a foot onto the property ladder, they’re faced with the stark reality of time having passed, whether they like it or not.
“The thing that my friends are always talking about is looking at the age their parents were when they had them,” says Ted Milligan, who’s about to turn 28. When Milligan was born, his dad was 29. Having a baby, in a year’s time, in this economy? No way. For one thing, he’s single, and has just this morning left his eighth job in ten years (“but it’s okay because the Edinburgh Fringe is quite cheap, notoriously”).
But even Trickey, 29, with a long-term job and girlfriend (a contrast they like to play up in their sketches, with Trickey generally playing the older, more grounded straight-man to Milligan’s frenetic characters) is not thinking about marriage, in spite of growing pressure from his parents, until it feels like a financially wise decision.
When will that be though? It’s the question that reveals the disparity between what was achievable in their parents’ era, and what’s likely now. With the average first-time buyer for a home in Britain today being 35, it’s surely impossible not to feel like the goal posts have moved for 30-year-olds when compared to the mid-90s. At the time, a first-time home cost around four times one’s salary as opposed to somewhere between 7.6 and 8.8 times one’s salary in 2026.
Unless receiving extra help from family, those who are able to beat the odds are, let’s face it, seldom working in the arts. For a comedian, who’s likely to spend several thousand on an Edinburgh Fringe run every year, it can feel “like you’re still waiting to be serious about your life,” says Rosalie Minnitt, 29.
Her character Lady Clementine embodies the feeling. Clementine, her parody of mid-twenties spiralling by way of Jane Austen (the show opens with the iconic line from 2005’s Pride and Prejudice adaptation: “I’m 27, I’ve no money and no prospects, I’m already a burden to my parents, and I’m frightened”) did remarkably well in 2023 – which surely demonstrates how many people out there are feeling the same way – but it takes more than one hit show nowadays to reach those impossible figures needed for financial stability.
With this year’s Clementine 2, she’s parsing the fact that while the feminist in her wants to girlboss through modern life in a way that wasn’t afforded to the Bennet sisters, in moments of despair she still can’t help but wish for a rich male benefactor.
It would certainly beat having to pack in comedy for something totally amoral, which Abby Govindan, 29, found out is the path of a lot of unreasonably rich 20-somethings today when she ended up on Forbes’ ‘30 under 30’ list. A ranking of young upstarts with career potential, the New York-based comedian was shocked to end up on it for writing jokes, while others on the list were arrested for financial crimes just a couple of months later – something she explores in her show Pushing 30.
Comedian Burt Williamson spent a lot of his twenties feeling the same sense of frustration. “Economic reality and stuff like that means that you don’t really get to feel like a proper adult until you are in your thirties,” he says. “And not for lack of trying.” But a year of undergoing genetic testing to see if he carries an inherited gene that makes him susceptible to motor neurone disease (which he explores in 30, Burty and Thriving) has made him more philosophical – not least because, worst case scenario, he doesn’t have to worry about a pension. “If I’m not going to live past 50, then a career in the arts looks like an act of foresight,” he jests.
Williamson says it’s been weird to think about his own mortality so much, but it’s made him stop and appreciate that he’s in a job he loves, doing exactly what he wants to be doing. Despite being “pretty broke at the moment”, a large reason he’s able to sustain it is the existence of the PBH Free Fringe, with its no venue costs or registration fees, which makes an annual Fringe show much more viable.
In a year where the Keep It Fringe fund for creators was slashed by over 90% after losing government backing, it’s a reminder of how important it is to keep the festival affordable for creators and audiences alike, lest we risk a shrinking pool of new comics. Because let’s face it, the demand is there and growing. It’s not just the comedians feeling the strain, it’s the audiences too. With all of our salaries stagnating as inflation skyrockets, if we don’t laugh, we’ll cry.
At least Williamson, the oldest of the pack, is a ray of hope that with age comes acceptance. Perhaps his stoic attitude awaits Trickey, Milligan, Minnitt and Govindan on the other side of hitting the big 3-0, though hopefully without the need for a nail-biting medical journey. Until then, thank god for comedy. Might as well keep being silly when you’re priced out of growing up.
Burger and a Pint: Treats for the Soul, Pleasance Courtyard, 5-30 Aug (not 19), 4.15pm
Rosalie Minnitt: Clementine, Shedinburgh, 11 Aug, 6.45pm
Rosalie Minnitt: Clementine 2, Pleasance Courtyard, 5-30 Aug (not 18), 3.35pm
Abby Govindan: Pushing 30, Pleasance Courtyard, 5-30 Aug (not 17), 9.35pm
30, Burty and Thriving, Voodoo Rooms, 8-30 Aug, 3.05pm