Edinburgh Fringe comedy review

Welcome to the working men’s club from hell, quite literally. 

Frankie Monroe, the weird owner and compere of The Misty Moon social club in Rotherham has entered into a demonic pact to keep his venue frozen in time, able to deliver his disconcertingly ingratiating banter, kitsch gags and awful magic tricks night after night, protected from modern mores.

He’s a grotesque figure, Sudocrem smeared unevenly across his face like a Superdrug Joker, wearing a shiny purple dress shirt and ill-fitting tuxedo. Reeking of desperation in his intense performance, we are in the ‘lunatic in a basement shouting at you’ realm of late-night comedy. And soon the Devil will be back for his dues.

And yet it’s all rather jolly. The horror element is pure pantomime, and although performer Joe Kent-Walters is more than capable of making the audience  feel uncomfortable, it’s never for more than a moment. He even takes time to assure us ‘I’m a well man,’ in a rare break from character, all-too aware that is not what we were thinking as he gets worryingly possessive about his special trowel.

As much as he plays up the weird and seedy, Kent-Walters primarily wants to celebrate the old-school variety circuit with all its oddball acts and cheesy showmanship in his truly unique way. You’ve heard of Phoenix Nights, well this is Phoenix Nightmares.

A better parallel is Vic & Bob, with their exaggerated old-school showmanship paired with avant-garde surrealism, but with just with a dash of the supernatural on top. The terrifyingly moth-eaten dog Monroe deploys in his cod ventriloquism act could certainly take his place alongside Morrissey The Consumer Monkey.

Other turns include a pisspoor Johnny Cash tribute act, and Monroe’s nephew, even more ill-suited to the stage than his uncle.

All the while, Kent-Walters – a previous winner of the BBC New Comedy Award and the Chortle Student Comedy Award – builds a strange community around him. How is it we all want the praise of him calling us a  ‘good boy’ with all the reassuring calm of a man who has you tied to a chair?

He is a fantastic comic performer, redolent of Rik Mayall in his utter commitment to the extreme absurdity and the predatory physicality of his performance. There are gags, too, some cheesy, some proper, but it's the wider, wilder, experience and the unhinged yet strangely likeable persona that you’ll remember.

Or maybe it’s just Stockholm Syndrome kicking in.

Review date: 4 Aug 2024
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
Reviewed at: Monkey Barrel Comedy Club