Comedy Festival review #9: Sam Simmons

SAM SIMMONS IN THE NET STARRING SANDRA BULLOCK
The Bosco, Melbourne City Square, until April 26
Tues - Sat 9.30pm, Sunday 8.30pm
$19.90 - $24.00

Rating: ****

Despite embracing narrative for the first time, the latest show from the loopy Sam Simmons has all the gleeful eccentricity his fans know and love.

Adelaide, 1995: On the first day of his new job, stacking oranges into pyramids at a Coles supermarket in a suburban shopping mall, the teenage Simmons loses his heart to a Sandra Bullock lookalike working at the local KFC. He seeks romantic advice from an array of unlikely sources - an amateur magician, a goth stoner, a permanently happy Argentinean - and illustrates the unfolding of his romantic quest with surreal songs and an improbably illustrated flip-chart.

Absurd and unpredictable, Simmons condenses more hilarity into an hour than most comedians could muster in a week. His adjective-laden material, which constantly detours into surreal territory, is a unique fusion of deadpan and hysteria.

Featuring the best Christmas carol medley ever, this show is not to be missed.

This review originally appeared in The Age on Wednesday April 8.

Comments

Unknown said…
I'm not sure if it is age, or simply just having some taste, but this was clearly the worst hour of supposed comedy I have attended. I honestly did not crack a smile.

Surrealism I think not. Clichéd, definitely. For a significant portion of the show, the word "SHIT" was left as the open page on a flipchart. Nothing could be a better summation of this show
17/4/09 10:29
richardwatts said…
Each to their own, Mick. But cheap jibes about taste asides, if Sam's show was 'the worst hour of supposed comedy' you've attended, what have you enjoyed, out of interest?
18/4/09 13:36
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