Lots of comics at the Fringe are talking about ChatGPT – but Tom Short gets the artificial intelligence chatbot to write his entire show. Using audience suggestions Short plans to find the formula for the perfect Fringe show..
This is his sixth solo Fringe show – and you may also recognise him as the Hype Man who will be joining Fringe favourite Phil Ellis on his nationwide tour. He also hosts Toms Shorts, a fast and furious free showcase where comics can hype their own shows.
Tell us about your show. Why should we go and see it?
My show is called Tom Short: I Get ChatGPT to Write My Edinburgh Show, which is both the title and a fairly comprehensive risk assessment. Every night I ask the audience what they think makes a five-star, award-winning Edinburgh show and then, live on stage, ChatGPT attempts to make one for me.
Unfortunately, AI doesn’t really understand the social purpose of comedy, frequently misunderstands what I’m asking it and has an extraordinary confidence in its own terrible ideas. So most of the show is me attempting to wrestle something entertaining out of an incredibly powerful machine that thinks it’s being helpful.
Every performance is different and the audience genuinely influences what happens. It’s somewhere between stand-up, improv, PowerPoint presentation and an increasingly hostile performance review between me and a laptop.
What is your favourite thing about your show?
The unpredictability. I genuinely don’t know exactly what I’m going to be doing every night. Sometimes ChatGPT produces something surprisingly clever. Sometimes it confidently destroys the entire show. Both are useful.
Do you have a Fringe idol?
Rik Mayall. Just the absolute commitment to being the most important person who has ever entered a room, even when everything around him suggests otherwise. It’s an energy I aspire to.
What three words best describe your performance style – and why?
Chaotic. Playful. Committed.
Chaotic because I like creating situations where even I don’t entirely know what’s going to happen. Playful because I want the audience to feel like we’re discovering the show together. Committed because if an idea is stupid, I believe the correct response is usually to pursue it much further.
Who are you looking forward to seeing in Edinburgh?
Phil Ellis. I’m lucky enough to get to work with him extensively and see up close the kind of work I aspire to make myself. He’s a genius and genuinely one of my best mates.
I also love Mat Ewins and Denzil de Cristo, who both do really interesting things with technology on stage. I’m fascinated by performers who use technology to make live comedy feel more unpredictable rather than less human.
What do you hope to achieve in Edinburgh – what are your hopes and dreams?
The modest goal is to create the greatest comedy show ever performed, receive unanimous five-star reviews and win every award available.
If that proves administratively difficult, I’d like audiences to leave thinking they’ve seen something they couldn’t have seen anywhere else.
What are the biggest obstacles you face as a performer at the Fringe?
Trying to persuade people that, amongst several thousand other shows, the thing they desperately need at 10.15pm is a Northern man arguing with artificial intelligence.
Also hills. Edinburgh has far too many hills for an arts festival.
What do you hope the audience will take away after an hour in your company?
Hopefully they’ve laughed a lot, but I’d also like them to leave a little more suspicious of the idea that we should hand over our autonomy to AI simply because it makes things easier.
I don’t think AI is inherently bad. It can be an incredibly useful tool and there are things it can do brilliantly. The danger comes when, often with perfectly good intentions, we start giving it decisions that really ought to remain human ones. The show ultimately explores what happens when you gradually hand more and more creative control to something that doesn’t understand why you’re doing any of it in the first place.
How do you plan to relax and recharge when not on stage?
I love doing properly touristy Edinburgh things. The Dungeons, Camera Obscura, wandering around all the bits you’re apparently supposed to have seen after coming here for years. This year I’m determined to actually see the castle properly, which somehow I’ve never managed to do.
What is your idea of a perfect Fringe day?
Wake up late. Have a nice breakfast. See something brilliant I’d never heard of. Bump into friends. Eat something irresponsible. Perform to a packed room. Get a five-star review. Win an award.
Even if I have to invent an Edinburgh Comedy AIward myself.
Tom Short: I Get ChatGPT to Write My Edinburgh Show, 22.15 Hoots, Nicholson Square
https://www.edfringe.com/tickets/whats-on/tom-short-i-get-chatgpt-to-write-my-edinburgh-show
Tom’s Shorts, The Garage @ PBH Free Fringe At Brewdog, Lothian Road
