Comic gets second RTE series

A DOWNPATRICK comic is set to return to RTE to front a secondseries of a near the knuckle comedy show.

The Blizzard of Odd, broadcast on Network Two, racked uprespectable ratings during its first run last winter.

And Colin Murphy, who served a tough comedy apprenticeship atBelfast's Empire, is fast becoming a cult figure down south amongstudents and young males.

RTE executives have given it the green light despite thecontroversial nature of some of the material, including clips fromdownmarket slasher movies, porno films and old public servicebroadcasts.

Stand-up Murphy, currently performing a one man show at theEdinburgh Festival, had been waiting anxiously for the thumbs up fora second series.

It has now been given and production is due to begin at the endof the month when the Belfast-based front man returns fromEdinburgh.

The show has captured a key audience for Network Two - malesbetween 18 and 34.

"It's performed very well among that audience and that's a keyreason for it being commissioned again," said Marian Cullen, ofproducers Independent Films.

She added: "There's a new director and more money but essentiallyit will be the same."

And that means Murphy casting his cutting gaze over a selectionof gems from the world of film, Internet and television.

Murphy has admitted the most terrifying - and satisfying clips -are the public service broadcasts featuring well knownpersonalities, many of them still with RTE.

More terrifying than the clips from porno and slasher movies andsome awful advertisements, he says.

Gerry Ryan and Bob Geldof were just two of many personalitieswhose pronouncements in the service of the public came back to hauntthem in the last series.