FestBuzz

What: The Com­edy Reserve
Where: Pleas­ance Dome
When: 8 — 31 August (not 18 and 25)
How Much: £7.50 — £8.50

In 140 char­ac­ters or less: “Doc Brown intro­duces a mish–mash of up-and-coming come­di­ans. Be warned — qual­ity varies considerably.”

In the­ory, The Com­edy Reserve is a great idea. Three up-and-coming come­di­ans share an hour-long show with a respected, but still rel­a­tively unknown comic per­form­ing com­pere duties. In prac­tice, how­ever, it’s some­thing alto­gether less than the sum of its parts. Doc Brown, London-based rap­per turned stand-up and brother to author Zadie Smith, cer­tainly per­forms the role of MC to the height of his con­sid­er­able abil­i­ties adding such much needed cohe­sive­ness to a bill of come­di­ans, each with an entirely dif­fer­ent con­cept of humour.

Jared Hardy is barely on stage before launch­ing into an excep­tion­ally self-deprecating rou­tine which, try as it might, can’t quite recover after the audi­ence loses con­fi­dence early on. Hardy claims to resem­ble “an emo Harry Pot­ter” but with his slight West Coun­try lilt, painfully scrawny frame and the admis­sion that he hails from Bris­tol, the char­ac­ter Sid from Skins is per­haps a more appro­pri­ate com­par­i­son. Like his small-screen coun­ter­part, Hardy appears ago­nis­ingly awk­ward and, while endear­ing in some small way, seems out of his depth in front of an Edin­burgh crowd.

Cana­dian comic Pat Burtscher (or “Pat Butcher!” as a lady in the next seat squealed with delight), by con­trast, seems excep­tion­ally sure of him­self though appears entirely unaware of the fact. Whether drug-induced or oth­er­wise, Burtscher spends the early part of his short set in a stu­por, only snap­ping out of it to bat­tle an errant mic stand. By the time he finally man­ages to attain some­thing vaguely resem­bling lucid­ity, he’s riff­ing off the sex­ual dif­fer­ences between men and women, end­ing in an out­ra­geous — and excru­ci­at­ing — mas­tur­ba­tion gag. Burtscher is cer­tainly an intense per­former but his dozey demeanour and crass pay­offs are some­thing of a let-down.

Final act Chris Stokes is a minor rev­e­la­tion after the pre­vi­ous two comics. Like Hardy, Stokes plays on themes of per­sonal dep­re­ca­tion and poor esteem but pos­sesses just enough self-assurance to pull it off. He is a decon­struc­tivist, play­ing on social mis­con­cep­tions and dis­man­tling them on stage. The pace is slow and mean­der­ing but there’s a sur­re­al­is­tic ele­ment that acts as a smoke screen, keep­ing the audi­ence dis­tracted while Stokes weaves addi­tional lay­ers into the fab­ric of a some­times thin ini­tial joke. His per­sonal life proves a rich source of mate­r­ial, as tales of his veg­an­ism and of liv­ing with his flat­mate are used as spring­boards for intro­duc­ing new con­cepts. It’s dif­fi­cult to see a rel­a­tively off­beat act like Chris Stokes truly going main­stream but the come­dian can cer­tainly expect to attract a cult fol­low­ing if this per­for­mance is any indication.

There are undoubt­edly laughs to be had at The Com­edy Reserve but with Doc Brown con­fined to his role as Mas­ter of Cer­e­monies, it’s left to Chris Stokes to lift the show above the level set by Hardy and Burtscher. As it is, he can’t quite man­age it sin­gle–hand­edly and his com­plex, dead­pan rou­tine may prove some­thing of a turnoff for many. Was the ticket price for The Com­edy Reserve a cou­ple of pounds cheaper it might seem a more rea­son­able prospect but as it is, it’s hard not to come away with at least a slight sense of disappointment.

Fes­t­buzz Rating:

Words: Jodi Mullen