Culminating in an audience member punching a stuffed monkey named Jonnie whilst Paul Foot shouts ridiculous syncopated mottos about equality for all mankind, this show provides almost unlimited energy and hilarious surrealist set pieces. Foot remains a master of his odd craft.
Witnessing him rocking vigorously forwards into a microphone, as if completely losing his mind, at the most unlikely moments in the show, is probably the biggest draw
Perfectly delineated into choice slices of silliness, Foot states early in the show: “My agent said that I couldn’t get away with messing about for a whole hour. So, I reluctantly wrote the best show ever.” Luckily for us all, it turned out that this still encompasses copious amounts of messing around. A highlight is the section of ‘literal surrealism’, a form of humour invented by Foot, based around things that are possible but still extremely unlikely. There also follows one of the oddest, shortest sketches at the Fringe, entitled The Pepper Pot.
There were a couple of jokes that didn’t deliver as effectively, such as the section on a teenager receiving a do-it-yourself terrorism kit through the post. These landed slightly short of the more warped logic that populates the rest of the show, and yet also couldn’t be classified as sketch comedy with groundings in anything vaguely plausible. Then again, I would actually vouch that it doesn’t really matter what it is that Foot is shouting at any moment. Witnessing him rocking vigorously forwards into a microphone, as if completely losing his mind, at the most unlikely moments in the show, is probably the biggest draw—completely hilarious and strangely reassuring.
