According to the fundraiser page for Now: Shame, this is a sketch show about two feudal peasants on their way to stage a drama event at a fair in Esksidedale cum-Ugglebarnby, in sunny Yorkshire.
30 July 2022
Hats off to the creative team at FaceOddity Productions for this kind of heads-up, because absolutely none of this would have become apparent from sitting through the show. In fact, it is probably sensible to eschew any expectation of plot or narrative here, and just look on this as a series of disconnected comedy sketches that range from sporadically amusing to out-and-out unfunny.
It is not that the show’s two performers, Fergus Head and Dominic Sorrell, lack talent or likeability. Head has a flair for accents and a feel for visual humour, particularly in the show’s best sketch involving a drama school class in waving. Sorrell is watchable and engaging, with a knack for finding a simmering spring of humour in material that occasionally feels as dry as the Sahara in August.
The content is good-natured enough and the writers have obviously taken pains to put together a piece that feels warm-hearted, kind, and inclusive. There is no ‘punching-down’ in the show, even if there is awful lot of the performers punching each other (presumably to make up for a dearth of actual punchlines). The ever-helpful website informs us that the writers’ aim is not to shy away from satire, which is true enough in the technical sense that there is absolutely no satire of any description to be seen.
There is a quite funny sketch set in art gallery involving a joke about a ‘well hung Stubbs’. The gag feels derivative but at least hints at a writing team with some nous about them. The idea of a kids’ history show, presented by hosts in funny costumes, setting out to give a child’s eye overview of Stalin’s atrocities shows similar promise, but goes nowhere, slowly.
Now: Shame is off to the Edinburgh Fringe and may well settle down once the performers learn what works and what does not. Some judicious re-writing and some better jokes will help, but the basis of tonight’s showing it may well struggle to get the audience it needs.
Duration: 50 minutes
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