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Natalie Haynes returns to the Edinburgh Festival for her fifth consecutive year of sell out shows with her new show Watching The Detectives. It is named after the Saturday afternoon seasons on BBC2 when Quincy, Perry Mason, Ironside, Monk and Murder, She Wrote would be screened, one after another. Over the years, Natalie soon became addicted to Diagnosis Murder, with Dick Van Dyke. When that wasn't on, she turned to Columbo to get the same fix. As methadone follows heroin, she was soon hooked on them all.

For some months now, Natalie has appeared at Robin Ince's Book Club ("London's hippest Comedy Night" - The Sunday Times), reading from the Diagnosis Murder tie-in novels, which, she concedes, are quite dreadful. For this year's show, Natalie thought about what worried her in everyday life, and pondered the problems that seemed to beset the society in which we live. The solution to all these unsolved problems seemed obvious to her - get the detectives involved - they can solve anything.

2 - 28 August 2006 (except 9th and 16th), 9pm at the Pleasance (0131 556 6550)

What the critics say

"The fastest-thinking female comic in the business, just as likely to tell jokes about Greek mythology as daytime TV" - Evening Standard

"Her spiky individualism and unabashed intelligence are rare among comics - male or female - and this new show deserves to draw and just when you think it's all getting a but too swotty, she'll come out with something bracingly vile" - The Telegraph

"Lightning mind and a winning smile" - The Independent

"This is no stream of consciousness - it's a tsunami." - Edinburgh Evening News

"Haynes talks so fast it's the comedy equivalent of a two for one offer; blink and you'll miss the quick wit and sharp asides her show is littered with" - The List

"Haynes' show is an electrifying, caustic and brutally funny hour" - Sunday Herald

"One of the best young comics on the fringe" - The Sunday Times

"The country's leading young female stand-up - she's shrewd, witty, talented, mightily intelligent, and she can deliver words at well over two a second for an hour" - Time Out

"Close to genius" - The Scotsman

"An enormous writing talent" - The Times

Links

• http://www.diagnosismurder.co.uk/
• The official Columbo site
• Murder, She Wrote on Wikipedia
• The official Monk site
• Quincy at cultidols.com