Comedy steeped in nihilism and vitriol
Albert Halls, Stirling JJJ
Wi t h d u s t s e t t l e d o n Je r r y Sadowitz’s briefest of runs at the Edinburgh Fringe, it’s left to the man himself to put the cancellation into context, his bitter recrimination reminding everyone that it was merely the latest in a long line of illstarred bookings, from Channel 5 hoiking his television show, to his infamous appearance at the Just for Laughs festival in Montreal.
Quadrupling down on the outrage this evening, with a devilishly funny encounter between the Queen and Jimmy Savile in death, he’s simply straightfor wardly offensive with his comments on Saturday’s petrol station explosion in Donegal. He makes light of the threat to show his penis, an issue in Edinburgh, repeats the p -word for Rishi Sunak, and arguably goes further in his characterisation of Kwasi Kwarteng, whose name he insists on mangling, with a visual gag so cartoonishly racist I would argue it’s impossible to take seriously as hate speech.
T h e r e ’s a n o c c a s i o n a l , unsettling, unironic burst of applause for some of his most vile tirades – and perhaps rather more insecurity than before in the sheer number of times he brands himself as an equal oppor tunities offender, that we’re “all c**ts”.
Despite the excess of his vitr i o l , i t h a s t wi s te d i n te r n a l logic, borne of nihilism and the sug gestion of shadowy, super-rich cabals controlling the world. Interspersed with the often brilliant, barefaced conmanship of the “dashing young conjurer’s” exceptional sleight of hand as he capers through card tricks, Sadowitz’s unfiltered spleen is often simply thrillingly wrong: the lurid descriptions he shares f o r c o r o n a v i r u s , m o n k e y - p ox etc, showcasing excep - t i o n a l ve r b a l d ex t e r i t y, h i s tongue-in-cheek admiration for Vladimir Putin a mischievous flight from reality.
O n l y w h e n h e ve e r s i n t o ranting for ranting’s sake – demanding bisexuals pick a side, maintaining scientists are making it all up – does his shtick lurch into tired self-parody. In the main, he retains a scabrous, sick vitalit y, justifying his absolute disdain for the crowd-pleasing comics who’ve followed him.