John-Luke Roberts builds a monster

The Voodoo Rooms is an apt location for John-Luke Roberts’ laudably out-there new hour, as he performs a fair bit of voodoo, on himself.

A co-founder of The Alternative Comedy Memorial Society—in which guest comics are only permitted to do wilfully bonkers turns—and recent graduate of Philippe Gaulier’s clown school, Roberts has happened upon a suitably unique angle for his solo work. Last year’s Stdad Up was an ingenious, often difficult ode to a late father. This is the more accessible sequel, if seemingly directed by Wes Craven.

The show's main body—and "body" is the word—features The Monarch, a gruff grotesque still loosely based on the dad figure he played last year, with a nightmarish twist. You’ve got to admire the sheer dedication, as every evening he dons a vast suit precariously padded with balloons, plus creepy fingers and ludicrous beard, then curls up stage-right to ominously await our arrival. Apart from Wednesdays.

Hailing from somewhere between Elm and Coronation Street, The Monarch spends much of the show telling audience members how they’ll die, in wickedly inventive ways, while also ingeniously utilising beer cans, celery and several torches. Eventually that cocoon-like form spews out thinner folk, including a bravura amalgamation of Gary Barlow and Alan Bennett who look remarkably like Freddie Mercury. Yes, it’s often baffling, but invariably brilliantly funny.

JLR even manages to slip in barbs about the likes of Trump and Liam Fox along the way. Oh, to see The Monarch on Question Time. They’ve invited weirder people.