Craig Hill

Craig Hill’s first public success came at age ten when he won a local talent contest in his native East Kilbride, impersonating the biggest divas of the day. He never looked back, going on to study Drama at Queen Margaret College, where his comedy characters as well as his ability to improvise new material led him naturally, but not directly, into stand-up. He was still an actor when a friend secretly booked him in for an “open spot” in 1998. So terrified that he had to be shoved on stage, it was his first ever comedy gig. The audience absolutely loved it—and so did he. Craig was hooked.

In 2023, Craig marked 24 years at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe—an extraordinary legacy, further heightened by his remarkable feat of selling out his entire seasons. He has performed the Toast tae the Lassies (with the reply by Val McDermid) for Edinburgh’s Lord Provost’s Burns Supper and was further honoured to act as an ambassador representing all Edinburgh’s festivals (including the Fringe and the International) for gala events in New York and Toronto. In 2008, he performed at the London Palladium stage to a rapturous reception and hosted star-studded variety show, Forbidden Vaudeville, especially produced for Lord Andrew Lloyd Webber’s prestigious Sydmonton Festival. In 2017, he donned his wellies for the first time to make his Glastonbury Festival debut.

Already much-loved as one of the stars of the Sydney International Comedy Festival, Craig made his smash-hit debut at the 2012 Adelaide Fringe and subsequently sold out seasons at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival as well as Sydney and Perth International Comedy Festivals. He has since returned to tour Australia annually and has guested on Australian TV’s most popular panel shows Good News Week, Spicks & Specs as well as hosted Sydney Comedy Festival’s national (often television) festival showcase Cracker Night for several years.

Other international work includes Montreal’s Just For Laughs Festival where Craig hosted the prestigious Britcom series as well as Bubbling With Laughter and his storming gala performance, recorded alongside an all-alumni line-up, saw him featured on UK TV’s The Best Of Just For Laughs. He has headlined the Comedy Stage for the Paaspop Festival in the Netherlands and also performed in Toronto, Paris, Madrid, Barcelona, Berlin, New York, Singapore, Amsterdam, Brussels, Ghent and Athens. He guested on Australian TV’s biggest panel shows Good News Week, Spicks & Specks and, each year, also stars on the Sydney Comedy Festival’s national (and usually televised) festivals showcase Cracker Night.

In 2018, he made a memorable appearance on BBC One’s Impossible TV quiz, winning the series final. In 2020, during the global pandemic, Craig featured on all four episodes of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe’s Fringe on Fridays live streaming shows. Working with Hot Button Productions and using a small crew operating under COVID-secure protocols, Craig recorded a series of online video shorts Craig Hill’s Livin’ la Vida Lockdown a comedy travelogue filmed on location at some of Edinburgh’s hidden gems. In December that same year, he performed Scotland’s first legally permitted and socially distanced live indoor comedy show since the world shutdown in March due to the pandemic in Inverness’s Ironworks. In 2020, Craig was one of just two headline artists to perform a COVID-compliant fringe season with ten shows at the Edinburgh Corn Exchange. As the world continued to open up in 2021, Craig performed a sold out fringe run of 24 shows with the ingeniously titled I Always Knew I Had it in Me, subsequently touring the show to great acclaim. This was followed in 2023 by the equally successful This Gets Harder Every Year!.

Each year, his latest Edinburgh fringe show goes on to successfully tour throughout the UK and internationally, his live tours consistently ranking amongst Scotland’s fastest-selling live comedy events. He hosts the Hogmanay street party events in Edinburgh and Inverness and is in great demand for corporate shows. Craig is firmly and deservedly established as one of the country’s best-loved entertainers.

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Craig Hill pretty much always finds a way to create glorious, camp, comedy magic out of his people. It is bordering on a relationship that is created in Craig’s shows and, indeed, that is much of what audiences flock to his performances for. His audience is an extraordinary mix… he creates bonds, and he creates laughter, and the atmosphere is fun. Craig himself is incapable of being unfunny.
– The Scotsman

Flat-out hilarious… I’ve not heard a room laugh so long and hard… There isn’t anyone better at working a crowd… the audience was in absolute paroxysms of laughter… He has a wide appeal and it is genuinely funny.
✶✶✶✶✶ Mirror

It’s hard not to love Craig Hill… the man is funny, and not just a little bit… Hyper-kinetic… ad-libbing with the audience at breakneck speed… Hill never missed a beat as he bounced back and forth with people who took his bait with apparent relish… all to raucous laughter… sending people into hysterics… It was great entertainment and impressive to behold as Hill flew by the seat of his kilt for a solid 70-minute set… Longtime fans can rest easy; Hill might have played with his form but he hasn’t messed with his love of naughty-boy humour, which is as cheeky as ever… Riotous!
✶✶✶✶ Herald Sun, Australia

Hill had everyone in hysterics from go to whoa… This is one highland fling you’ll never forget!
✶✶✶✶½ Adelaide Advertiser

Wickedly subversive as well as risqué and rib-tickling… Craig Hill is one of the funniest men in Scotland. If you only see one show at this year’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe go and see his. You will simply love it.
✶✶✶✶✶ Edinburgh Reporter

Riotously funny… his energy is boundless… He is that rare thing, a naturally funny comedian whose skewed expressions are enough to keep us happy. But he is also a terrific singer… tiny vocal masterpieces alone worth the ticket price.
– Independent

Class. Risqué, rib-tickling and absolutely screaming from the rafters… Hill actually has to wait until the audience stop laughing before he can start again. It’s absolutely hilarious…His across-the-board appeal to both the young and old is that his humour is—largely—family friendly. Obviously this is why people are wiping tears of laughter from their eyes.
– Evening News, Edinburgh

High-octane… Irresistible… An hour with Hill makes for a cracking show!
– The List

Craig Hill live is a revelation…. The patron saint of camp comedy… His spur-of-the-minute stuff, when he shoots straight from his kilted hip, is priceless… Hill is more of a Loony Toons cartoon character than a flesh and blood comedian… Akin to watching Jim Carrey dance the Highland Fling.
– The Scotsman

An evening of no holds barred fun and wicked japes… Craig is hilariously naughty, an immensely talented mimic and a whirlwind of camp cheekiness who, by the end of the show, had the most reluctant and unrhythmic of his supporters out of their seats clapping and dancing. An absolute delight.
 – Liverpool Echo

Camper than a big camp of campers pitching up their pink sparkly tents, but funny as hell.
– Scotland on Sunday

One of the most uplifting and hilarious things I’ve seen at this year’s Fringe… Talented, evanescent and exciting… See this show while you can!
– Three Weeks

A master of audience interaction. He blew the roof off the full theatre… wonderfully smooth improvisation interspersed with fast gags.
– Chortle

A show you wish would last forever… If you had to go to the same show every night of the festival, then this would be the one.
– Radio Forth

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Official  Website

@craighillcomedian on 

@mrcraighill on 

Craig Hill on 

Craig Hill on 

Craig Hill on Spotlight 

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See  Live

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