Edinburgh Fringe comedy review

James Roque may be new to Edinburgh, but he’s a 13-year veteran of the comedy scene in New Zealand, where his telly credits include being a panellist on their version of The Masked Singer.

That experience speaks volumes as he’s in friendly command of the small room right out of the gates, with a gag-filled introduction setting out his stall. Badong, he explains, was his childhood nickname in the Philippines, which has stuck with him into adulthood. But now, at 31, he’s grown increasingly ambivalent about it and thinks it might be time to move on.

The show is essentially his immigrant’s story, recalling how he felt like an outsider in Auckland – ashamed when he brought a national dish for lunch on the first day of school that made him stand out from every white kid and their bland sandwiches. On day two, he joined them.

In the audience today are a couple of rows of Filipinos, ‘Little Manila’ he dubs them, who enthusiastically confirm his stories from home, the jokes resonating hard with his compatriots.

For the rest of us, he makes vivid his attempts to fit in, which morph into him being the joker, then harbouring a self-loathing about playing up to other people’s expectations, then angry indignation about the way things are. This is all told with self-effacing bemusement about how the various former versions of himself acted, rather than any great ire about why that had to be. Because the final stage of his evolution has been to be comfortable in his skin – and that’s what shines out of his assured, affable delivery.

There are a few messages in the show, straightforward but effective, with accepting yourself for who you are being the big, obvious one. Some of that came from his realisation that most of the world comprises good people doing their best to accept others, even if they occasionally stumble from a lack of knowledge. That’s healthier and hopefully more than accurate than assuming everyone’s a bad egg with the worst motives.
 
Rewinding to his youth, he tells us about learning English – with a fun section on idioms that are nonsensical if you weren’t brought up on them – and sharing the ‘wild shit’ he discovered white people got up to as he started mixing with them more.

The most bizarre story regards a peculiar corporate gig in which a wealthy businessman paid him to play a member of the Malaysian royal family to relive a past glory, despite not being Malaysian. It’s a unique experience, and Roque tells the story effectively, balancing self-deprecation at the humiliations he would endure as a struggling actor with the absurdity of those with more money than self-awareness. 

All the characters in his stories are brought to colourful life, too, especially the mother for whom everything had to be a grand gesture and a father who was just a bit odd. It was they who gave him the Badong nickname, after the unlikely hero of a popular, but low-budget – and ridiculously plotted – 1990s Filipino movie. And yes, we do get the clips to laugh at its shoddy production values and ham acting.

Luckily, Badong, the stand-up show, is the epitome of slick and professional presentation by a comic at ease on stage and with his material.

• James Roque: Badong is on at Gilded Balloon Teviot at 8.20pm

Review date: 22 Aug 2022
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
Reviewed at: Gilded Balloon Teviot