Stevie Martin, Monkey Barrel ★★★
Stevie Martin is part of the generation of comics for whom the internet is a natural home; she has racked up tens of millions of views for her work online, where she had to strut her stuff when the world went into lockdown.
But having debuted as a solo comic in 2018 (after being one-third of the talented sketch group Massive Dad) she wants the thrill – and the exertion – of appearing before a live audience again, she says, so here is Clout, a tightly constructed hour of comedy full of ideas, not all of which land.
Recently acquired habits die hard; first Martin must dig down into the data, analyse the algorithms, and determine what works for an in-person hour, while all the time referencing her online comedy and how we live our lives on the internet. It's nicely meta, and the onstage screens are used to good effect for some visual gags and payoffs.
Martin's comedy is not confessional but she tells us a bit about herself at the top of the show; she's a millennial – “Which no one has ever spoken about on stage before,” she says drily – she has a boyfriend, she has a dog. But are those things true, or merely another construct? We find out as the show progresses.
Along the way Martin talks about online trolls, her mobile phone habit and going viral with an accidental gag – and there are very good jokes about, of all things, Shakespeare and fish fingers.
Colin Hoult, Pleasance Courtyard ★★★★
For some years Colin Hoult has been known to Fringe audiences as his alter ego Anna Mann, the comically deluded fading actress whose career highlights are very much behind her. He retired the character last year and for Fringe 2024 has returned, sharply suited and booted, as himself.
It's a welcome debut, as it were. Hoult is an affable presence on stage and the story he tells in Colin is a personal one, about how a lad from a working-class Nottingham background can make it at the world's largest comedy festival. He has also recently been diagnosed with ADHD, a condition which we might guess at with Hoult 's repeated diversions and tangents as he interrupts himself while telling his tale. It starts with “1986, Christmas Day, Nottingham” and is not explained until the final few minutes of the show.
In between, we hear about his family, characters all, who are comedy gold. Hoult, while mining that comedy for big laughs, talks about them – his parents, his older brothers – with real affection; they obviously allowed a fey young lad to thrive in what could have been a hostile environment, in a place where anyone who showed difference would be labelled “They're not right”.
Those that were properly “not right” were shipped off to Mapperley, a mental institution that loomed large in the locality. But Hoult did all right, and now he has a family of his own, having married into a different social class – which provides some more astute gags about difference.
Some may find the material about his children a little soppy but it's to drive home his points about fatherhood and family, and this is a delightful hour of storytelling.
