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	Upstairs at Three and Ten (venue website) Comedy 19-20 May, 5:00pm-6:00pm
Suitable for age 15+ only.  Warning: Contains strong language.  World Premiere.

Four-man comedy sketch troupes are a dime a dozen at Fringe time… but there’s something almost priceless about the Beta Males.  It’s not just that their material’s funny and zippy; what sets them apart is their ability to conjure crazily twisted, oddly credible worlds, and to spin their antics together in a sparkling narrative strand.

We’ve five-starred their Edinburgh productions for two successive years, and our comedy editor Craig Thomson gave 2011’s Train Job an appropriately first-class review.  It was almost cinematic, he wrote, in its inexorable storytelling – a comedy thriller which left its audience electrified.  The Space Race is a whole new show, but there’s a reassuring familiarity to its fast-paced theme; this time, rather than being trapped on a speeding locomotive, we’ll discover the untold history of Britain’s quest for the stars.

By the time it lands in Edinburgh, it’s sure to be brilliant.  But Brighton runs, of course, are often works-in-progress – and with a tightly-planned plotline so crucial to the Beta Males’ appeal, only time will tell if they’re quite ready to fly.  So if you’re going to be in Edinburgh this August, perhaps you’ll want to save this treat till then.  Otherwise, catch it on the launchpad… and enjoy the extra frisson of being a pioneer.

Read our full review of last year's show, The Train Job, at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2011.