The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
Happy as Larry to get back on stage
Glasgow comedian Larry Dean is among the many performers making up for lost time in 2022.
The taboo-busting stand-up had just launched his latest show to glowing reviews when the pandemic struck in 2020, depriving the whole world and his dog of the chance to take in the new material.
It’s no surprise then that his latest confessional offering has been more vigorously performed over recent months than had previously been possible.
Courier Country audiences can get a proverbial measure of the man when he plays rescheduled dates at Dundee’s Whitehall Theatre on Tuesday and the Webster Theatre in Arbroath on Wednesday.
And if neither of those suit, there’s a third chance at Carnegie Hall, Dunfermline, on June 25.
What to expect? Well, according to Dean himself, it won’t be quite the show that was being bandied about before the world was turned upside down.
“The main thing about the show is it’s two years late!” he points out, desperately trying to keep a straight face.
“The show originally was to do with relationship-y break-up stuff, but it was coming from me when I was single – I’m not single anymore.
“So right now the show is really just all the funniest bits that I’ve come up with over the past couple of years.
“It’s difficult to go, ‘Oh, the show is about this, or it’s about this...’ because it’s not a film, it’s a comedy show – so there’ll be jokes.”
Known for his bawdy and surreal sense of humour, the white trainer-wearing japester has forged his reputation on his ability to tell a hilarious gag.
He first made his mark with his observational style a full decade ago, when he won the coveted Scottish Comedian of the Year honour in 2013.
Now aged 32, Dean really arrived in the big league at the Edinburgh Festival three years later with his critically-acclaimed laughter banquet Farcissist.
His Fandan offering the following year cemented his Fringe reputation as both a hot ticket and a comedians’ comedian for a new stand-up generation, led by his kindred Clydeside spirit Kevin Bridges.
In between, the selfproclaimed “vagina dodger” impressed a Uk-wide audience on the BBC hit Live At The Apollo with his side-splitting yarns about his experiences as a gay man from Glasgow who’s not in the least bit camp.
Such an approach followed on from his Out
Now show, which told the story of coming out to a strict Catholic family, and Farcissist’s revealing probe into his life post-coming out, as well as his longterm relationship and readjusting to the dating scene.
Always keen to engage in banter with the audience at his gigs, the funnyman also has a blast taking on accents and doing impersonations.
The Irish and the English tend to be favourite targets in between madcap moments when he channels all manner of species from dogs to dinosaurs – but rarely, if ever, to act as a mask or a shield.
Anything can happen on the night and probably will, Larry Dean has the rare knack of turning selfdeprecation into something of an art form.
Tickets for Larry Dean on June 7, 8 and 25 from Ticketmaster or the venues’ websites.