Michael Fabbri: Fabrications

Michael Fabbri grins at us with the menace of a serial killer. It’s the hazard of having such piercing blue eyes, he tells us. But whilst the amiable comic flirts with such darkness throughout Fabrications he never quite reaches the killer line that would move this performance from wryly comic to hilarious.

Commenting on the absurdities of the everyday with a gentle charm that coaxes one into giggles rather than belly laughs, Fabbri’s material skates along the predictable with a few nods to the darker recesses of human experience. A joke about being sick on a girl whilst shagging her as her boyfriend watches is unbecoming of this affable comedian, and is met with the same tentative reaction that greets other risque but ill-judged gags. 

Where Fabbri does well is in his offbeat delivery and evocative, quirky characterisations. He conjures the stars of his (apparently) average life with an envious ease and has an eye for turning the normal into the absurdly ridiculous. But although material about call centres and cats with epilepsy raises a smile, it’s not unique enough to truly stand out in a saturated Edinburgh comedy programme.