festcomedy Sam Simmons: About the Weather
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If you thought flatpack furniture was such well-trodden comedy ground it could never provoke a standing ovation, Sam Simmons’s show will prove you wrong. What he builds with Ikea components in About the Weather is astonishing. The comic play, about a sadistic radio weatherman narrating the life of an incompetent loser played by Simmons, further gives inspiring instruction on how to inject a little of the Aussie’s weirdness into your own life. A narrator taking over the “strikingly beige days” of a bus-riding drone is not a new idea if you’ve seen Stranger Than Fiction. But the spoken subconscious of Will Ferrell in that film was never as wonderfully surreal as Simmons’s, as he jostles with Gillette jingles and chocolate owls. The play’s chaotic plot proves compelling too. Its climactic rant recalls Trainspotting’s monologue in
Tom Deacon: Deaconator
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As a Radio 1 presenter and former winner of the Chortle Student Comedian of the Year award, Tom Deacon’s standup has often been intimately tied to the travails, habits and vices of being young. Now 26, circumstances have forced Deacon to grapple with the prospect of actually growing up a bit, but not before he performs one final tribute to his younger self and achieves something he never has before. The Herculean task in question? Completing an entire World Cup 2010 sticker album. It should be understood that this is not merely a key routine of the show, but the show itself. Almost
terms of its angry brilliance – a call-to-arms against every banal thing hindering Simmons’s right to be strange. About the Weather perhaps relies too much on the incongruous music gag. Opera, latino, and Crazy Town come booming through the speakers at many odd moments. But Simmons’ physical performance demonstrates real commitment to his ‘art’ (as he describes it aggressively to an “arty-looking” punter). Slapping his face with slices of ham to ‘Desperado’ indeed resembles performance art, as well as being bloody funny. This is the fifth Fringe during which the 35-year-old has been dividing audiences. The most consistent thing about his arbitrary antics is how much they will still appeal to some; About the Weather certainly does judging by this crowd’s response. [Catherine Sylvain] Gilded Balloon Teviot, 9:15pm – 10:15pm, 12–26 Aug, not 13, £10.50 – £11.50
every joke spins off from the central narrative of Deacon explaining his tangled, nostalgia-laden history with football sticker albums, his mentally scarring experiences with ‘swaps,’ and the ever-escalating difficulties he encounters in his attempt to finally put his childhood obsession to rest. Because the vast preponderance of material deals with this one story, Deaconator feels smaller and shorter than it actually is, coming off more like an extended joke than an entire performance. However, Deacon is a warm and canny comedian, who manages to wring every possible drop of empathy towards his unlikely pursuit, making us care even if we never spent our youths gluing pictures of footballers
22 fest edinburgh festival guide 2012 | August 14 - 16
into cheap, glossy magazines. Though light on ambition or variety of subject matter, the story of Deacon’s personal quest will have many quietly cheering for him by the end, when the audience is
rewarded for their attention with... free football stickers. [Sean Bell] Pleasance Dome, 7:00pm – 8:00pm, 12–25 Aug, £8.50 – £9.50