"Law is unmissable on this sort of form" - Jay Richardson reviews Tony Law's Maximum Nonsense.
Tony Law has always been uniquely Tony Law. But with Maximum Nonsense he’s resolved the inconsistency and self-indulgence that has so often undermined his shows with a barnstorming performance retaining all of his usual wingding absurdity, except that it’s punchy and ridiculously entertaining to the crazy end.
Dismissing comedy convention from the start, by glorying in his unsociably early afternoon slot and lack of promotion, his audience engagement and “Banter!” are at once delightfully plain-spoken and counter-intuitive,as he insults his front row with slamming compliments. Michael McIntyre-style observations; shock comedy and the burgeoning practice of comics backing gags with musical accompaniment are all delightfully subverted by the daftest means conceivable, the latter contrived with a steel drum the Canadian has picked for his Trinidadian heritage, rather than his ability to play anything but the saddest notes.
Against all expectation, he even performsa bit of material about his kids, though naturally enough, they’re recast as trolls, frustrating his fifteenth century Mayan priest lifestyle. These surreal glimpses of family life are doubly endearing because in the main, they’re subsumed by a series of shifting oddball personas, including that of a 1908 Olympian, a Jeremy Clarkson-acquainted member of the posh Chipping Norton set, Vikings, pirates and an enraged grizzly bear.
Almost everything is deconstructed as it’s uttered (“it’s the asides I enjoy!”). And he delivers the obligatory, voice-lowered moral of a meaningful Fringe hour with appropriate gravitas, that is to say, virtually none. His big finale is a stunning riposte to the once justifiable claim that he has no idea how to end a show. Building from a seemingly throwaway routine about a couple of elephants walking into a bar, it escalates through a musing on caricature and stereotype into a genuine showstopper. Simply by being himself to the nth degree, Law is unmissable on this sort of form.
Tony Law: Maximum Nonsense is at The Stand at 12:30pm until 2th August.
Read more Edinburgh Fringe reviews
Add an event
Review: Disgraced at Bush Theatre
Writer Ayad Akhtar is a peculiar tour guide taking us through very familiar territory, intent on showing...