Generally speaking, stand-up showcases are the sorts of show that offer the worst of both worlds, since audiences have to either sit through some desperately unfunny jokes from stand-ups that have been rejected by other venues, or try and enjoy the contracted, edited version of a good routine. Sadly ‘Are you a technophile?’ was no exception to this observation.
Emily Wood, who both compered and performed in the first slot of the showcase, was simply dire. Although her routine was ostensibly about the modern love for technology, it mainly consisted of a series of unconnected jokes and anecdotes about Facebook etiquette, heavy drinking and how much she likes Twitter (a lot, apparently). Wood’s comic timing was way off and for parts of her set she seemed to be primarily performing for the benefit of a friend sitting in the front row rather than for the audience. Her stage persona started off as likable, but later nose-dived into the land of the annoyingly unfunny and whatever she was aiming for seemed to lack any semblance of a credible, professional act.
Next up was Nathan Wood – a simply unlikable comedian who began his set by offering everyone in the audience some codeine phosphate tablets. When you have to open your set by bribing punters with prescription drugs, then you know you’re probably not that good at telling jokes. Whether Wood was actually drunk, high or just pretending was unclear, but the quality of his patter made me wish I could drink away the experience of watching him. Wood’s only coherent material included a spiel about how much he despised the monarchy, but even this turned out to be just an atrociously boring rant.
The third and final act of the trilogy was Lost Voice Guy. Considering the low bar set by the preceding acts it sounds like faint praise, but he was much funnier and much more likable than the comics he shared a stage with. Still, this was pretty basic comedy and, whilst amusing, lacked consistency or any sort of theme.
To the true technophiles among you – don’t bother logging in to this time trap.
