list.co.uk/festival Reviews | FESTIVAL COMEDY
N A M R O N N A G R O M ©
BENNY DAVIS Technically supreme renditions of hits ●●●●● WIL HODGSON So-so trip down memory lane from Chippenham’s finest ●●●●●
BJORN GUSTAFSSON Curious spectacle from a Swedish celebrity ●●●●●
Benny Davis asks how many people in the crowd have seen him as one third of Axis of Awesome, announcing ‘if you haven’t heard “Four Chords” where’ve you been?’ Now going out on his own to display some fiercely virtuosic piano skills, the technically supreme The Human Jukebox still feels a little bare. Davis travels through the ages of pop, rock and
dance, identifying tunes from Snap! to Alice Deejay and Spice Girls. Mixing in slight comedy about busking in Sydney, Davis’ years of studying music have clearly paid dividends in a show that’s hard not to smile at. Some classic rock hits are mashed with themes tunes and TV adverts, while he asks the audience to throw up requests: ‘if I’ve heard it, I can play it’, he assures. Not without its flaws and limitations, Davis’ hour
of definitive recitals from across the decades is plenty of fun and promises a blissful rekindling of deconstructed music. The comedy and narrative that Davis tries to force just aren’t there, however, and it’s better when he simply sticks to playing. (Andrew Latimer) ■ Gilded Balloon Teviot, 622 6552, until 25 Aug (not 12), 10.45pm, £9.50–£10.50 (£8.50–£9.50).
There was a time when Wil Hodgson seemed destined to be the future of British comedy. An hour in his company is still a pleasing experience, but he appears to have dropped his mojo somewhere down the line. Certainly, he couldn’t have kept going on forever with shows about growing up in Chippenham, skinheads, ‘real women’, wrestling, My Little Pony etc, but even he admits that his current show is rather lightweight and just a ‘nostalgia fest’.
Leave the Landing Light On does concern more childhood memories, but rather than opening up unfamiliar worlds, it’ll be easy for more people to connect with his recollections of being a British comics geek. He moves on to stuff that genuinely terrified him growing up, such as public information films and Willy Wonka (the Gene Wilder interpretation) while actual nuclear threat had little impact and the Universal horror films had scary monsters he simply related to as an outsider.
It’s all perfectly fun, but fritters away to very little, leaving Hodgson buffs misty-eyed for the heavyweight sets of his past. (Brian Donaldson) ■ The Stand III & IV, 558 7272, until 25 Aug (not 12), 11.40pm, £8 (£7).
Before the show begins there’s some crackly mic problems. We think they’re unintentional, but judging from the rest of the show you can’t really be sure what’s meant and what isn’t. Björn Gustafsson has been famous in his Swedish homeland since he was 20 (he’s now 27) but his debut at the Fringe is one of the most curious this year. Eventually, a tall blonde sporting a suit in IKEA
colours is shoved onto the stage. Offstage, a voice berates us as we applaud: ‘that’s not even me, it’s my brother’. The show is an exquisitely peculiar spectacle of comedy and music that harbours a Pythonic quality, yet there are also shades of old- school British comedy too. Where the pair work together to undermine each
other’s endeavours is reminiscent of Morecambe and Wise, and elsewhere they perform deliberately out-of-tune numbers in the Les Dawson vein. The show runs somewhat under the advertised hour, although, to be honest, after 45 minutes your brain is so befuddled anyway. Regardless, you’ll still be laughing on the way home. (Marissa Burgess) ■ Gilded Balloon Teviot, 622 6552, until 12 Aug, 11.59pm, £9.50–£10.50 (£8.50–£9.50).
PAJAMA MEN A physical romp through an ocean of characters ●●●●●
For some acts, the breakdown of their technology is a disaster akin to temporarily losing a limb. When microphones malfunction on three separate occasions, Mark Chavez and Shenoah Allen simply wait for their techies to sort the problem, making comedy hay from the predicament. Of course, we don’t know what gruesome consequences might take place behind closed doors afterwards, but onstage, the Pajama Men are the picture of restraint, riffing on their hushed circumstances, musing on what life is like when everyone at the back of a very large, sold-out room can hear each utterance with clarity. For those familiar with the Pajamas physical / character- led thing, Just the Two of Each of Us won’t hold too many surprises. The pair roar, bellow and whisper their way through various duos (jealous lovers, old men, newsreaders, a medieval king and his Igor-like servant, a cop riding a motorcycle) as a complicated story of an ancient quest somehow touches everyone in their tale. It’s easy to simply sit back and wonder at the inventiveness of the Pajama Men (their only props are two chairs while the now established third member, Kevin Hume, provides a musical backdrop to proceedings) and it’s just as much fun to watch them enjoy themselves. Possibly the larks they are having sometimes go too far, the giggling a little obtrusive, but being able to laugh at your work is surely one of life’s joys. The secret of their success stems from an ability to just about do the lot: they are naturally funny, brilliant mimics and can vividly portray any number of people or things (here, an arcade machine or a human-eating monster). No wonder they’re having the last laugh. (Brian Donaldson) ■ Assembly Roxy, 623 3030, until 26 Aug (not 12, 19), 9pm, £13–£15 (£12–£14).
8–15 Aug 2013 THE LIST FESTIVAL 53