Edinburgh Fringe comedy review

He’s an actor, so of course, he’s posh, pretentious and self-centred. 

Casey Filips is not redefining any stereotypes with his alter-ego Tobias Finlay-Fraser, a dim, unctuous, egotistical thespian turning up for his audition, confident that he alone can save the dramatic arts.

After boasting of his classical training at countless drama schools, indulging his ridiculous vocal warm-ups and doling out multiple headshots showing his full range, he’s ready to impress the casting directors - us.

Melbourne-based Filips is a solid clown, with broad but believable physicality filling the small Pleasance Cellar. His alter ego may be larger than life, but his stupidity renders him harmless, and he doesn’t encounter many problems recruiting a couple of volunteers to offer considerable help in performing his audition piece (Though I’d be astonished if one co-star he selected tonight wasn’t already an actor elsewhere on the Fringe).

What he wants to present turns out to be an absurd scene about the mating ritual of manatees, played straight-faced despite its obviously comic premise. After all, Finlay-Fraser is a legitimate ac-tor, and must conduct himself seriously. The skit then picked over from various angles, stretching what’s already a flimsy idea – and proudly so –  gossamer thin.

Similarly, Filips will persist in repeating bits of business until he gets the reaction he wants. It’s all tongue-in-cheek, with the performer making a virtue of how asinine this all is, but the show feels slower than it ought to be, since he only has the one audition to fill the hour, and there’s only so much improv with the audience that can prop it up.

Other diversions to help include a few phone calls from his agent – a Jewish New York archetype who always gets the wrong end of the stick as he never lets Tobias get a word in edgeways. And at the end of the audition, we fast-forward to the Oscars ceremony, a bit of video editing that revels in its cheapness, to see our star get his just rewards.

It’s all stuff-and-nonsense, constantly entertaining without ever soaring into wild extremes of spontaneous comic creativity.

Review date: 19 Aug 2024
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
Reviewed at: Pleasance Courtyard