Review by Steve Bennett

About 45 minutes in to his show Ari Shaffir announces that since the comedian on in the Hive after him is having a day off, he’s just going to go ahead and do 90 minutes, since he wants to road-test his next televised stand-up special. Value for money for many, especially for a free-to-get-in show, but not all of us have Fringe schedules which are that flexible. So if there were any grand revelations in the last 20 minutes, I can’t report back.

I doubt it, though, for Shaffir announces that this is an American-style stand-up show with ‘no theme, no crying’, just jokes. But that’s a bit disingenuous as the first half,at least, was built around the fact that a friend of his got pregnant on a Tinder date, information he repeats with increasing incredulity after each segment. What’s more, his friend didn’t tell the father until eight months after the event…

This story gives him a core on which to share his views on parenting and youngsters, which can be summed up in his brief statement: ‘Children are garbage.’ That should be the title of the special, which even features a section calling babies out on their bullshit.

For he’s a ceaseless cynic, betraying the convention that children are adorable, and garnishing his anecdotal material with a judgemental tone and the occasional dark edge. In fact, he’s so much of an arsehole, he’s going to vote Donald Trump, just to see what happens. He might just be making mischief, but that’s more controversial even than that is his bit making the religious case FOR abortion. He spent three years in a yeshiva, so let’s just assume the theology is sound.

The second part of the show seemed a lot more predictable. Every comic who goes to Amsterdam and does gags about buying weed and going to Anne Frank’s house. On the first, he has something of a different angle, but it doesn’t shine, the second was largely as expected, unless there was a later payoff, even if being Jewish adds a bit of extra heft, and certainly sense of duty. But as he moved on to the etiquette of telling former partners about an STD diagnosis, the anecdotes started to feel more genuine.

Shaffir, host of the storytelling Comedy Central series This Is Not Happening and a voice in the new Seth Rogan animation Sausage Party, never quite ascends to the killer routine, but his dismissive no-nonsense attitude is appealing, his gag count high and his delivery more than capable of holding a room for 90 minutes. Just don’t bring your children.

Review date: 21 Aug 2016
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
Reviewed at: The Hive