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Latest items? Unedited? Fringe Report Uncut
Rhod Gilbert & Mark Watson
in
Stereocomics
Verdict: Sharp and gifted comedy
A recklessly handsome couple of men from Wales, and not a bestiality joke in sight. Confused? Meet Rhod Gilbert & Mark Watson, a pair of comedians in almost-matching denim, aka Stereocomics.
Though sheep and cow buggery are absent, there's football played with a grandma's pancreas (still attached to grandma, alas), in Rhod Gilbert's extremely film-noir world. It's a homely place of Welsh cottages (of the residential rather than Ron Davies type) laced with pyschiatric cynanide, where bad things happen behind lace.
In a brisk set, he covers terrorism, Welsh rain, dirty bombs, pacifists in Austria, disintegrating grandparents, how to stalk (in detail), organ donation problems, and much more. There's some great lines: 'Nobody wants to see their mother burst under a car'.
Rhod Gilbert looks aimiable, a medium-height and friendly-faced card in butter-wouldn't-melt-in-his-mouth striped cheesecloth shirt. Quiet, too, in a serial-killer kind of way. There's a faint air of menace - a friendly kind of menace - and the material's from a world some distance away from the real.
Mark Watson charms with his impish facility with language. He handles English like a Formula One driver, and gets away with a lot, including rape (talking about it, that is).
Tonight he's in dark blue corduroy jacket, blue t-shirt, and blue jeans. His eyes are enormously expressive, sometimes looking huge, his eyebrows leaping to contain them. His ears are elfin. It's a great set of comedian's apparatus, and Mark Watson knows exactly how to use it.
'In Wales we have a proverb: "If you have a promising career, don't jeopardise it by raping someone"' kicks off an ebullient set littered with sly filth and funny jokes. The Big Read, one-book wonders (a great joke here), assessing men's cocks in lavatories, Off The Kerb, Bracknell, footballers, Cliff Richard and much more follows. It's impish, engaging and lots of fun.
Rhod Gilbert and Mark Watson work together and separately in the show, taking part of it as a duo, and joining each other's solo segments in voice-over from off-stage.
Tonight's audience includes comedy doyenne Hils Jago, BBC Sitcom Talent producer and Hopkins & Glover director Izzy Mant, producer Jane Bell, Comedy Store agent Charlotte Foley, and comic Matt Dyktynski.
Cast Credits (alpha order): Rhod Gilbert, Mark Watson.
Company Credits: Technical operator - Rachel Abel. PR - Greta McMahon.
END
John Park
reviewed Monday 5 July 04 / The Enterprise
Fringe Report (c) Fringe Report 2002-2012
www.fringereport.com
