*** Nicely crafted blend of sketch and stand-up comedy
We should see more of Ms Hart, although at 6'1" there's quite a lot of her already. This hour showcases well her brand of silliness.
I usually have trouble with comedy of embarrassment, because I keep sympathising with the embarrassed party. One of Hart's strengths is that she can put herself in awkward situations without generating that kind of uneasiness. The show pretends to be a technical rehearsal of a one-woman piece in which she (with the double-barrelled surname Hart-Throbs) is about to go on as understudy: in addition to Hart, we see a couple of incompetent techies and a ludicrous pain of a director.
It's a clever idea, as it means that sketches don't need to be fully written – we can be shown just enough to get the idea and a few funny lines – and also that, as the others rush around to get the theatre ready, Hart can be left to her own devices to chat to an imaginary audience (of course, the real audience plays the imaginary crowd) in more stand-uppy segments.
Formerly half of double act The Orange Girls (or about 65% by volume, her former partner being a wee slip of a thing), Hart in her own right is shown to be a distinctive and endearing comedienne.
Written for divento.com
Copyright © Ian Shuttleworth; all rights reserved.
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