Review by Steve Bennett at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival

He’s in a big room, but Jimeoin deals in the comedy of the small. His topics are the minutiae of behaviour we barely notice, and his performance could never be described as big either, with his muted delivery forcing the audience to lean in to listen.

It brings an added intimacy as he talks about the social faux pas we all make, and either wilfully ignore or don’t even notice. Often these involve bodily functions, but when is a fart not funny?

He suggests he’s a henpecked husband, a slightly dated comedy dynamic, but he seems genuine about it, while wistful memories of his parents, lead into observations from his childhood in a different era which anyone middle-aged or over will surely identify with. 

Jimeoin’s skill is in the reconstructions, miming out everyday rituals ranging from crossing the road to seeing himself in the bathroom mirror – subtle movements exaggerated for our amusement. It his his cartoonish facial expressions that really make the routines, with his stand-out segment recreating the way he communicates with his wife at a party through raised eyebrows alone.

Not all of this is new - either from him, as his material evolves at its own pace, nor as a contribution to the caucus of comic material – but it’s all quietly impressive in its droll execution.

He never gets carried away with the gig, choking back any momentum to check that he’s appearing confident, but not too much so, or commenting on the fact the audience just enjoyed a joke ‘but seemed tricked into it’. After 28 years in the business, many of them as a star in Australia, he still has the air of a man who can’t quite believe people are paying to see his trivial nonsense – as quietly amused by that reality as he is by life in general.

The casual approach means there are some lulls among the LOLs, and he doesn’t always appear to be on top of his own show. He even seems ready to wrap up about 40 minutes in, picking up his guitar for the closer. But actually he does go on for the full hour – just over, in fact. Was his prematurity a mistake, of just part of the loose, laid-back charm he trades in? We’ll never know.

Review date: 1 Apr 2017
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett