Edinburgh Fringe 2017
Low Down
Bec Hill provides the jokes. You provide the order. A brand new hour full of stand-up, pop-ups and post-its.
Review
This show is a real audience pleaser. And why not? They determine the order of jokes many have heard and seen before. The majority of people who came to this show had been to previous shows and heard Hill before. As we enter the room , Hill hands us coloured balls we will throw at her later in the show and she welcomes us with a smile. It feels like we are visiting her in her living room. On stage is a large board with all her joke topics and the audience will call out the ones they want to hear.
The show is deceptively casual. In reality it is beautifully planned and well organized. Hill welcomes us on stage and tells us she wants to make the show fun for her audience. She certainly meets her goal. Everyone there has fun. She points to the board with the post-it topics and says, “I am a lot like a post it: colorful and sticky.”
And so she begins. She is married now and she says, “People say, ‘Do you want a baby?” and tells us this is not on her agenda. “I have a huge ego,” she says. “I cannot imagine a world before I was born.”
Her jokes appear to be improvised conversation about the topics on the board but in reality they are well crafted and she is a charming performer. “I try to be as PC as possible,” she tells us as the audience calls out the topics they want to hear. She has several illustration boards to supplement her jokes and a delightful song sung with the irrepressible Jay Forman. Her observations are very human: “I can be in a room with another person and not get killed.”
The audience adored this show. This reviewer would have liked a more recognizable theme and a bit more substance. However it has to be said, with all the hustle and bustle of a day at the fringe it is very relaxing to listen to an hour of casual nonsense that has been orchestrated for our pleasure. There is nothing haphazard about this show. There is also very little to take home and think about. But as I said, the audience loved it and you may well too.
