Sean Hughes' show about his father's death manages to avoid the "cliché and potential mawkishness" of this increasingly common theme.
After a few disappointing, diminished returns at the Fringe, this is a resurgent comeback from Sean Hughes, embracing the trend for 'dead dad' shows but navigating the clichés and potential mawkishness with the grace and skill of a seasoned storyteller who retains some playful surprises up his sleeve.
He had a difficult relationshipwith his father, a gambler and drunk who wanted him to be a jockey, and whose idea of a laugh was ushering his cockney son into a Dublin comprehensive. But he was there at his death bed and recounts their fractious bond with dry, unsentimental clarity, in contrast to the drug-induced eccentricity of Hughes Snr that prompts somewaggishly surreal moments.
There is pathos here certainly but the Irishman never relies upon it, peppering his monologue with rascally asides and perceptively savage wit, his comparison of the NHS to Stoke City one of his abiding quips. Scenes like his observation on the manipulative, stirring music applied to heart-rending situations like this, are very much of the piece, along with some seemingly inconsequential banter with the show’s technician. But others, such as the insensitive remarks of his relatives at the wake, and his working-class weakness for a free bar, have the roguish charm and lyrical nimbleness of his best stand-up.
He doesn’t ask for sympathy and is eminently capable of being philosophical and cruel to achieve it, both with audience members and the rest of his family. Nevertheless, he does succeed in evoking empathy, passionatelyarguing for experimental treatment for his father against all logical reason, convincing you that despite the oppression of Catholicism and alcoholism, there was a damaged love between them. More thoughtful and less bitter than his recent Edinburgh shows, Hughes appears in the right frame of mind to endear himself to comedy audiences all over again.
Jay Richardson
Sean Hughes - Life Becomes Noises is at the Pleasance Courtyard at 5:30pm until 27th August
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