Edinburgh Fringe comedy review

Often shows get the dreaded single star because they are offensively bad – but General Secretary joins the club for being so tediously bland.

With barely any jokes, weak performances and no ambitions to say anything, it can stake a good claim to being the most ‘meh’ show on the Fringe.

The premise is as good or bad as anything else. That two ordinary people with no experience or knowledge have been chosen to run the world, since the supposed great and good have made such a hash of it. In case you don’t get that set-up, it’s needlessly explained thrice: from the point of view of the UN bigwigs who commanded it, from the uninspiring office workers chosen, and in a news report.

That’s typical of the flabby script from performers Cassie Symes and Georgina Thomas, collectively known as Thick N Fast, which could probably lose at least half its scenes with no impact on the story.

For example, the history of the world is depicted in a series of flashcards: ‘agriculture’, ‘trade’ and ‘war’. The payoff is that the last one says ‘Google’. Isn’t that just true? Satire, I guess they were aiming for.

Here’s another: their characters are opening a hospital and face hostile questioning from the press. Cassie knows kissing babies is a thing politicians do to curry favour, so mimes taking one from the front row, bringing it to the stage and kissing it (normally, not some clowny exaggeration), prompting a journalist to ask in the same accusatory tone as before: ‘Why are you kissing that baby?’ And scene.

Huh? What was the point of that? There’s no story advancement, no joke, no nothing. Just another wave of pointlessness washing over the long hour, every dull scene forgotten the moment it’s over.

If we’re looking for some positives, and it’s difficult, the pointed bickering between the joint news anchors is mildly amusing, as is Georgina’s occasional mistaking of a dictator for someone with a vaguely similar name. But the pickings are thin.

Meanwhile, their performances are of such low effort that some of Georgia’s lines evaporate into the air and can barely be heard. Their central characters are also flat and uninteresting, a couple of very ordinary people, one a little more desperate to please than the other, that’s her defining character trait.

Once ruling the world, the pair come up with bad policies – banning oil, taxing orgasms (‘in-cum tax’ is the only proper joke of the hour) – and it all goes tits-up. Then they are corrupted by power and deregulate everything at their demand of their new corporate paymasters. Once they realise what a mess they’ve made of things, their only recourse is to write a song that will unify the world – oh god, no, do they have to? - and job done.

Oh, and if you’re going to namecheck global leaders in a bid to sound vaguely relevant, you should probably be aware that Angela Merkel has been out of office for eight months. It’s clearly a mistake for her to be in the show - something any ticket-holder will identify with.

• General Secretary is on at Gilded Balloon Patter Hoose at 3pm

Review date: 15 Aug 2022
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
Reviewed at: Gilded Balloon Patter House