Lost and found love story
Disclaiming that prior to a guilt-trip inducing encounter with Bridget Christie, this was meant to be simply an hour of “stupid jokes,” Alex Edelman would usually only venture into political comedy to assess recent US presidents for sexiness, Barack Obama having prompted something of a sexuality rethink. But a Radio 4 broadcaft of one of his old shows brought a number of anti-semitic trolls his way on Twitter. This became considerable admin for the Bostonian Jew, whom you could describe as crafty in his response if it didn’t feed into the slurs.
Edelman, as he reveals with recourse to his Israeli Olympian twin brother and exceptionally long birth name, is pretty Jewish, growing up feeling white but not too white in multicultural, mixed-up America. So when his Twitter feed opportunistically offered him a chance to attend a Nazi meeting, he went along out of curiosity, intrigued to see if he could pass unchallenged among the enemy. What follows is a compelling portrait of the mob racist mind, humour abundant in all its confusion and contradiction.
Equally though, there are some intriguing questions about white privilege as the comic explores his motivations for risking his safety, not to mention the malleable, people-pleasing instincts that see him contribute to the meeting’s discussions. Despite some pretty rampant insecurities, he’s always had a can-do attitude, which he illustrates with his encounter with Prince William at the Baftas, momentarily forgetting his place to quip-worthy account. Painfully self-aware, with an acute observational wit that dredges beneath the surface of most cultural analysis, Edelman’s gag rate is impressive, ensuring another really strong hour from the American. A “carnie” in a yurt rejecting the fourth wall of her idiosyn-
One Life Stand
Roundabout @ Summerhall (Venue 26) This year’s Fringe surely bears few more evocative reflections of life as a British twentysomething in 2018 than playwright Eve Nicol’s One Life Stand, produced by Hull-based company Middle Child. Set over one rainy night in the city, it plots the points between three souls who are varying degrees of lost, but so close to being found.
Kat is a career woman whose lowly point on the ladder has her still travelling on buses, not taxis, and whose sexual frustration manifests in picking up a lover on the internet; her boyfriend Kit is a fast food delivery cyclist with a puppyish manner and a borderline unhealthy internet porn obsession; and Momo, the teenage girl who interacts with both at some point, is bullied and sexually
cratic venue, superb physical comic Tessa Waters could hardly be more of a Fringe experience.
Opening the show with a pillow fight, the Australian sprinkles games with the audience around a series of sketches, never letting the energy in the tent drop while fostering a lively and warmly inclusive atmosphere.
Some of the skits address the feminist struggle, with some mimed smashing of the glass ceiling and disposal of the collateral damage. But you’re more likely to recall her tour de force career through a house party, a series of gurning, grotesque act-outs that really impress, the distinct characteristics of various drugs identifiable through the whirlwind metamorphosis. The measure of any comic relying on engaging a crowd so directly is do the audience wish to be involved? And the answer with Waters is resoundingly yes, with volunteers bounding from their seats, reluctant to leave when it’s over.
In the cold, critical light of post-analysis, I’m really not sure what’s going on with her waterslide sketch. But at the time everyone involved just goes for it, Waters’ spirit harassed by the boys at her school since an explicit film of her having sex with a teacher was shared around, even though what she feels about the clip is closer to empowerment than shame.
This is a quirky romantic(ish) comedy
of abandonment infectious. Impressively limber, deceptively strong and the gamest for a laugh, she’s a mischievous delight.
@Johnlewis: Never Knowingly Undertweeted
Laughing Horse @ the Newsroom (Venue 93) Fans of upmarket shopping and rigorously heart-tugging viral Christmas adverts know that John Lewis is one of the most successful department stores in Britain right now, but what they may be less aware of is that John Lewis is also a computer sciences teacher from the US state of Virginia. Unfortunately (depending on your perspective on the merits of social media) it’s the former who took the Twitter handle @Johnlewis first, which means that he regularly hears the complaints of disgruntled transatlantic shoppers in his mentions.
Written (with Ben Nardone) and performed by Simon Jay, whose timely topical spoof life lived in two separate dimensions; one, the real world, richly described in the rainy gutter where Kit is beaten after crashing into someone on the street or the sheltered space between the bins where he and Momo share a fish supper; the other,
Trumpageddon is in its third successful year at the Fringe, @Johnlewis tells the story of John Lewis’ relationship with John Lewis, from his belief that refusing to change his handle will be of help to his students in understanding the internet onwards.
Although there are bumps on the road – Lewis appears to be mildly addicted to the internet, checking away at his tweets in class, and is mistaken once again, this time for Trump-baiting senator and civil rights leader Joe Lewis – real social or satirical meat is lacking. Indeed, both John Lewises appear to have approved the project, which gives it the predominant sense of a cosy, quirky extended anecdote. Yet Jay is a capable comic actor, and an hour in his company is no chore.
Anchor
Greenside @ Nicolson Square (Venue 209)
Falling in love is easy, staying the online fantasy where all three get to be their best, most sexual, most desirable selves. The trio of actors involved – Tanya Loretta Dee (Kat), Ed Cole (Kit) and Anna Mitchelson (Momo) – pace the stage with hand-held microphones, the only props aside from Kit’s racing bike, and there’s a raw, gig-like urgency to their delivery.
What’s going on musically is also embedded in and hugely important to the show, with what amount to two parallel soundtracks – by James Frewer and Glaswegian band Honeyblood – giving a rich flavour of the overwhelming cultural torrent available online. When Kit sends Kat yet another cute puppy gif, a splurge of electronic noise pumps through the room, and when an emotional highnote is hit, the trio harmonise on choruses bordering on musical theatre. A cautionary tale of our need to get to grips with the way mass connection is remoulding us, its message is needed. in love is harder – something everyone who has experienced it will recognise in this playful two-hander. Dancers Elsa Couvreur and Mehdi Duman, of companies Woman’s Move and Cie Divisar respectively, arrive on stage dressed in their underwear. They drag each other around the floor, at turns weighed down by the responsibility or enjoying the ride, echoing the complex nature of any romantic relationship.
Once dressed and upright, the push and pull begins. They try to walk but bump shoulders, ramming harder and harder until it’s part sexual act, part holding each other back. The inevitable resentment has arrived, and Couvreur and Duman are left screaming into the air in frustration. But – and it’s a big but – they still love each other, so what next?
The highs and lows of love are nicely observed here, but Anchor operates solely on one level, which feels like a missed opportunity. It’s not until the lovers briefly cling onto each other as if their lives depended on it, that any kind of emotional resonance arrives. Whatever you have seen so far, you have seen nothing like this. I do not want to ruin the element of surprise/ shock/delight/revulsion/ hilarity/horror that Correos works so hard and risks so much for in this crazy, messy show, but you will never feed your cat or pump up your bicycle tyres again without pause for thought, and probably laughter. I say risk: Correos is, he tells us, in danger of copping a £2,000 fine if he destroys the velvet drapes at the back of the stage.
And one feels, ultimately, it is inevitable. He starts off slowly with what feels like simple, slightly hesitant, stand-up. But there is nothing simple about this hour, and even quite a lot of not standing up.
Fans of Hentai, sliced ham, extreme mess and Birmingham will love this show. Anyone who can appreciate a well-controlled gag reflex will love this show. Anyone who likes to see a performer simply fling everything at the wall and roll around in anything that doesn’t stick will love this show. But if you worry about escaping testicles, it’s possibly not for you.
Why is there never a Malcolm Hardee Award around when you need to give one?
Casanova Dreaming
thespace @ Niddry St (Venue 9) This handsomely mounted, earnest production from writer-director Martin Foreman moves swiftly but ultimately goes nowhere. A 19-year-old Casanova is awakened by the arrival of the elderly Chevalier de Seingalt. Soon Casanova’s bedchamber comes to resemble a scene from a Marx Brothers film as various characters walk in and out to indulge in elliptical exchanges with both of them, but the absurdity of the situation is never acknowledged. The costumes are excellent and the large cast don’t put a foot wrong but these brief snippets of a life lived, not wisely, but too well are rarely diverting.