Rich Hall

Rich Hall returns to the Fringe with two shows: his regular standup plus a boisterous hoedown. This hour-long game of combative, transatlantic compare-and-contrast delivers the same furious, snarling wit expected at any of Hall’s gigs and is the perfect teaser for the later knees-up. Just as expected, he hits all the liberal G-spots, with annihilating routines on US gun culture, British apathy and a total intolerance of po-faced politicians running for office.

“We have politicians named Mitt and Newt. One’s a Mormon and the other’s a serial adulterer. So one hates same-sex marriage and the other hates same-marriage sex”. This couldn’t epitomise Hall’s comedy any better: a series of mini-miracles that blend politics with wordplay and energy to marvellous effect. He’s retained his hardcore deadpan identity throughout his career and it shows no sign of letting up, possibly to his detriment at times as the set can lean too heavily into rant territory.

Hall is the master of the tirade, however, balancing political lectures with epically constructed payoffs. Kraft Foods is one company in the line of fire, spoiling and corrupting “innocent” companies such as Cadbury. Must there be more evil in the world? To thwart it, Hall massages improvisational songs into his show, chatting to and incorporating audience members and their jobs—from dog-groomers to former civil servants—exposing the gears of his comic agility working in overdrive. Just as there’s no respite in Hall’s measured and handsomely poetic set, there’s no escaping that this is a blissfully topical hour of comedy.