The over-all winner and best newcomer from this year’s Edinburgh Comedy Award proceedings – Adam Riches and occasional Penny Dreadful Humphrey Kerr - will both take to the Soho Theatre stage this weekend.

Riches is optimistic that his current stand-up show, as seen in da Burgh last August, will translate well for the London crowd. Speaking to Time Out, he says: “In Edinburgh, everyone in the room, I hope, felt included and possibly threatened. But yes, it will work at the Soho. Theatre, it will just be a case of trial and error. But for the purposes of this interview, it’s going to be great, it’s going to be better!’.

You can catch up on Adam’s full Time Out interview here, or there’s always the chat he had with our sister site ThreeWeeks last August. The details and tickets for his Sunday Soho Theatre show, meanwhile, are stashed here. And finally, here Riches is portraying the one, the only, the VERY LOUD… Daniel Day Lewis.

Opening today at London’s Strand Gallery is ‘Funny Faces’, a new exhibition of 40 portraits of celebrity stand-ups and comic thespian types. Jimmy Carr, Al Murray, David Mitchell and Omid Djalili have all donated autographed mug-shots, as taken by Paul Heneker, to the collection, which will be auctioned off when the show closes on 17 Dec. With limited edition prints of each photograph also available for a mere £30, all proceeds will go to homeless charity Shelter.

Also lending her image to the cause is Edinburgh Fringe favourite Izzy Suttie, aka Dobby of ‘Peep Show’ fame, who has these words of encouragement: “Christmas should be a time for giving, receiving and arguing over the last Quality Street – not worrying about a roof over your head. I hope that through the ‘Funny Faces’ exhibition we can help raise money to support Shelter’s work this Christmas – so get bidding now!”

So, if you’re stuck for something to get your loved one for Christmas this year, a signed portrait of… say, Simon Pegg, might just be the one. More info on the exhibition here.

Taking their cue from the good old TED Talks (you know the ones… those big high profile lectures as delivered by Bill Clinton, Bill Gates and some people not called Bill, these days all streamed for free on the net), comedians Ben Target and Daniel Berg will this Thursday conduct the third in their own series of seminars aimed at discussing and dissecting the world at large.

Each PLEB Talk (as the duo have christened the project) thus far has proven to be a highly paletteable mixture of the academic, the ambitious and the absurd (that’s where the chucking Quorn comes in). And, with guest speakers including Mighty Boosh co-hort Rich Fulcher, Penny Dreadful Thom Tuck, and ‘Life’s Too Short’s Gareth Morninan taking to the makeshift lectern for this week’s PLEB happening, it seems comics are clamouring for a taste of sweet existential debate.

Below, you can view a cryptic trailer that reveals next to nothing about what goes on at the PLEB Talks. Meanwhile, this Spoonfed feature gives away slightly more. If all that has inspired you to buy tickets for the next event, which takes place on Thursday at a secret London location, those can be got here.

The Turner Prize isn’t the only thing putting the art world in a spin this week, oh no; there’s also the matter of whether or not Team Tate will opt to extend their 21-year partnership with sponsors BP. Having first struck a deal with Tate Britain in 1990, the oil giant today spends over £1m each year on the Tate network of art spaces, and a number of other galleries, museums and arts institutions across the UK.

It seems, though, in this increasingly eco-aware age, and no doubt with the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf Of Mexico still very in much in everyone’s minds, that a significant portion of the Tate’s members and visitors would rather do without BP’s help, thank you very much, after 8000 of them signed an open letter urging Tate Trustees against renewing the sponsorship deal.

There has also been dissent amongst the top Tate ranks, with trustee Patrick Brill criticising BP’s environmental record and branding the company a “disgrace”. Tate Director Nicholas Serota, presumably torn between wider public opinion and a need for funds, has acknowledged that the Trustees’ decision will be “very difficult”. Well he’s got that right, at least.

With a decision due from the Tate board any day now, Chris Sands of Liberate Tate, one of a number of organisations behind the aforementioned petition, has this to say: “Tate can no longer respond by simply stating that BP is an important sponsor of the arts. Tate’s visiting public and its own members are saying in large numbers that maintaining a relationship with an oil company like BP is harming both the reputation of Tate and the experience of enjoying great art in a public gallery”.

Stephen Fry and Fyfe Dangerfield of indie troupe Guillemots are amongst those involved in a new stage adaptation of Diana Wynne Jones’ fantasy novel ‘Howl’s Moving Castle’. Fry lends his narratorial voice to the production, which runs until 7 Jan at the Southwark Playhouse Vault, while Dangerfield is responsible for the music.

In seeking a fresh interpretation of Wynne Jones’ story, the creative team behind the new production – including Dangerfield – have deliberately sidestepped comparisons with Hayao Miyazaki’s Oscar-winning 2004 animated adaptation of the story. In fact, in Fyfe’s case, he made a “conscious decision” to not even read the book. The Guillemot told the BBC: “Some people may come expecting to see a stage version of the film and it’s nothing like it really. I just wanted to take my inspiration as directly as I could from the script”.

You can find the BBC’s full interview with Fyfe alongside thoughts from ‘Howl’s Moving Castle’ producers Davy and Kristin McGuire, here.

Having released their first post-hiatus album, ‘In The Grace Of Your Love’, earlier this year, The Rapture will be stopping by for a two-date UK jaunt next May. But wait, there’s more, because the band are also set to play an exclusive interactive London show on 12 Dec.

Presented by Dell, Intel and Vice Magazine’s joint live venture, Noisey, as part of their Special Engagement Concert Series, fans will get the chance to choose the band’s encore track, design merchandise for their new single ‘Sail Away’, and even join them on stage. The entire set will be streamed live on the Noisey website. Details on how to secure entry to that show, which goes off at Rowan’s Bowling Alley in Finsbury Park, can be found here.

Say The Rapture, in sweet and perfect unison: “Thanks to Noisey, we feel quite lucky to engage in far reaching ways to fans all over the world. This sounds like it should be a damn good concert”.

Meanwhile, here are the regular old 2012 dates:

1 May: Oxford, Academy
2 May: London, Shepherd’s Bush Empire

Noel Faulkner, owner of Shoreditch’s Comedy Cafe, has announced the imminent closure of the venue’s main room and an overhaul of its programming, apparently because he’s tired of “brainless” audiences. Plans are in place to open a new upstairs venue at the club, which, by also hosting ‘theatre nights’ and showcasing more new talent, he hopes will begin to attract a more discerning crowd.

Says Noel: “I have been hacked off with the level of brainless wankers in the otherwise lovely audiences we have been getting, and I have now decided to change the direction of the comedy and bring it back to what most serious theatre people would appreciate. Friday and Saturdays will still be stand-up, but more so for the thinking man than the Page Three man”.

He adds: “For 20 years I have suffered, pandering to brainless fools but now it’s my turn to create the kind of live comedy venue that I would go and see”. Well, at least he’s honest. For more on the Comedy Cafe and its owner, here’s an interview Time Out did with Noel for the club’s 20th anniversary.

So, Ricky Gervais stepped in to discuss his new comedy series ‘Life’s Too Short’ with ‘Front Row’ presenter Mark Lawson last week.

I think it’d be fair to say that the show, a mockumentary-style sitcom centring on the not-so showbiz life of its 3 ft 6 protagonist, Warwick Davis, has taken a good deal of flack from critics, and some would say deservedly so. Audiences have also seemingly voted with their feet, with viewing figures falling steadily from 2.5 million for episode one, to less than half that tuning into last week’s installment.

Spirited in his defence of the programme, Gervais told Lawson that he has passed through various phases in his feelings towards critics; from craving their approval, to deliberately setting out to “annoy” them. Now, it seems, he’s indifferent. He says: “I haven’t got a problem with critics. But I think that many people mistake the subject of a joke with the target of a joke. And I’ve had that my whole career”.

You can hear the interview, which aired on last Tuesday’s ‘Front Row’, by downloading the podcast version of the programme, which – as we write – is still available here.

US actor Zach Braff confirmed late last week that he’ll make his first ever West End appearance early next year in ‘All New People’, a self-penned piece set to play at the Duke Of York’s theatre from 22 Feb. Though best known for playing loveable kook John ‘JD’ Dorian in now-defunct hospital sitcom ‘Scrubs’, Braff’s been doing more serious stuff for a good while now, not least ‘The Garden State’, the quirky feature film he wrote, directed and starred in back in 2004.

For the initial off-Broadway run of Braff’s new play Justin Bartha, star of the ‘The Hangover’, took the role of central character Charlie. But with Bartha now seemingly out of the picture, Braff will make his debut as Charlie – a 35 year-old man in crisis who seeks solace in his Long Island beach house, only to be interrupted by a pageant of oddball guests – for British eyes only.

Says Braff: “It’s always been a dream of mine to do a play in the West End. I never imagined I’d be lucky enough to have it be a play I’d written. I would have been happy to set up shop in Hyde Park”.

Details have been announced about next year’s HMV Next Big Thing festival, which will take place from 2-12 Feb at nine venues around the UK, including various London haunts and HMV venues in Manchester, Birmingham and Edinburgh.

200 bands are set to play, with various nights curated by different labels and music media also thrown into the mix this time round. Each night will be a tenner including booking fee, and tickets are on sale right now. This time round the gigs will also be recorded, with highlights made available via HMV’s websites.

Artists already confirmed for 2012 include: Emeli Sandé, Delilah, Lianne La Havas, All The Young, Dry The River, Clement Marfo & The Frontline, We Are Augustines, Loick Essein, StooShe, Beth Jeans Houghton & The Hooves Of Destiny, Jodie Marie, Yasmin, King Charles and Fatoumata Diawara.

More at hmvnextbigthing.com.