HUGE

Set against the backdrop of life on the road for touring comedians, HUGE is a harrowing psychological thriller (for readers of Linwood Barclay) and the debut novel from award-winning screenwriter and International Emmy nominee Brent Butt, whose popular sitcom Corner Gas (viewed in 60+ countries) spawned a theatrical feature film and the current primetime series Corner Gas Animated (Prime Video, IMDbTV)

Dale Webly is a road-weary comedian on the back half of a mediocre career, who is starting to consider the grave and soul-crushing option of getting a “real job”; hip, edgy Irish stand-up Rynn Lanigan is on a very different trajectory and is in the running to host a new network television show – the two end up travelling together across a remote and foreboding stretch of rural countryside performing a run of live shows in some unlikely communities, but it's their opening act, and not the crowds, that have Dale and Rynn the most concerned: Hogie is overly keen, strangely intense, and emotionally volatile, and as the tour progresses, his increasingly bizarre behaviour swells and spirals until his true capacity for violence is starkly revealed, leaving Dale and Rynn trapped in a van with a maniac in the middle of nowhere, wondering if they're going to get off the road alive
• HUGE shines a spotlight on the little realized reality that comedy and horror are not-so-distant cousins – in certain situations, every word skates along the narrow, twisted edge that separates laughter from violence
• This is a world Brent Butt knows well: before his sitcom success, he was a highly acclaimed stand-up, performing at top comedy clubs and festivals around the world (including a performance attended by Queen Elizabeth II)