Latitude 2014
Low Down
A brand new show from the Edinburgh Comedy Aware Winner and star of Alan Partridge: Alpha Papa.
Review
The queue to get into the Theatre tent to see Tim Key at this year’s Latitude festival stretched so far into the woods that the last person could not see the middle, let alone the front of the queue. “It’s worse than Alton Towers!” remarked my excited companion. The man who was propelled to fame when he played Alan Partridge’s Sidekick Simon in both Mid Morning Matters and Alpha Papa has earned widespread acclaim for his stand-up performance, and the eager anticipation shared by the hundreds in the queue did not go unrewarded. This was a show that delivered clever and seamless wit in an expertly crafted format, under the guise of a slightly awkward bumbling nerd.
The show is entitled Single White Slut. It begins with Key, dressed in dark grey overalls and pointed brown boots, introducing us to his dishevelled bed with which he shares the stage. He reads one- or two-lined poems from the back of pornography-themed playing cards. These poems form the backbone of the show, some leading to questions directed at the audience, one or two of whom end up joining him in said bed; others leading to seemingly fanciful yet somehow unnervingly plausible anecdotes. Such as his time spent in a movie trailer with Anne Hathaway, his travels through India that lead him to a failed attempt at a threesome to the soundtrack of the audiobook of We Need To Talk About Kevin, stories about owls, stories about Russian girls with moles that look like insects; still more poems trail off into amusing/ bemusing silences from performer and audience alike. And all this interspersed with fantastical appearances from a mystical co-performer who materialises from the bed to deliver some kind of sensual fairy dance to Key at various points throughout the production. The perfect balance of unexpected, unconventional and brilliant.
All too soon, our hour is up and Key announces that we have successfully passed enough time to go and see Damon Albarn perform on the main stage. Reluctantly, we file out, giggling and buzzing and smug that we chose our evening’s entertainment so wisely. Single White Slut is bizarre, hilarious, expert comedy theatre and impossible to put into words. Just go and see it.
Show Website
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Key
