I managed to snag a last minute ticket to Tim Key's Masterslut during its London run. Wholly unfamiliar with Key's work (and a little suspicious that based on the title it was not my cup of tea) I ventured in without any context. I was pleasantly surprised by the show. Somewhere between the absurd poetry, the odes to bathtubs (actual bathtub included), and the audience interaction I found myself falling for Key's wacky charm. Key's performance was quite varied. From film clips, to physical stunts, to his poetry, to the deconstruction of the poetry, it was a substantial 80 minute show.
After my unexplained resistance to Simon Amstell I was wondering if I was a one British comedian type of girl (Daniel Kitson or NO ONE). But it turns out I'm a little more British comedy slutty than I thought (well I already knew I liked Josie Long so I was already kind of cheating on Kitson). Key sets up his pull backs and reveals very skillfully. He undermines expectations in a delightful way that were both clever and smart. Speaking of a girl he invited back to his apartment "To be fair, she was more a situation than a girl." His set-up about the pornographic playing cards that he has laminated his poems to provides a great number of jokes about the unexpected. For some reason one of his poems really caught my fancy: "Some of the other cubs convinced Kenneth there was a badge...for arson."
Key has a goofy persona but one that takes himself and his bath-loving endeavors quite seriously. Baths are as he calls them "nature's womb." I enjoyed his banter with his technician and driver Dougie. I found the image of Key and Dougie careening around the English countryside with a bathtub in the back of the van trying not to spill any water quite funny.
There was a lot of audience interaction. After Key's stints in his bathtub (yup) he was toweled off by a member of the audience. Key enjoyed the lavish attention furnished by his male towel bearers at
the show I saw. He interviewed audience members over their bath-time proclivities. There was a part in the show where he has the audience put together a sentence one word at a time by each person in a row. Our audience group started with the word "strawberry banana". We ended up with a sentence about a person called Strawberry Banana. Key's improvised response to this was "If Vera Drake had been called Strawberry Banana it would have been a different story." True indeed.
I guess Key doesn't perform much (at all?) in New York so he's one to look out for at the Edinburgh Fringe and on tour in the UK.
After my unexplained resistance to Simon Amstell I was wondering if I was a one British comedian type of girl (Daniel Kitson or NO ONE). But it turns out I'm a little more British comedy slutty than I thought (well I already knew I liked Josie Long so I was already kind of cheating on Kitson). Key sets up his pull backs and reveals very skillfully. He undermines expectations in a delightful way that were both clever and smart. Speaking of a girl he invited back to his apartment "To be fair, she was more a situation than a girl." His set-up about the pornographic playing cards that he has laminated his poems to provides a great number of jokes about the unexpected. For some reason one of his poems really caught my fancy: "Some of the other cubs convinced Kenneth there was a badge...for arson."
Key has a goofy persona but one that takes himself and his bath-loving endeavors quite seriously. Baths are as he calls them "nature's womb." I enjoyed his banter with his technician and driver Dougie. I found the image of Key and Dougie careening around the English countryside with a bathtub in the back of the van trying not to spill any water quite funny.
There was a lot of audience interaction. After Key's stints in his bathtub (yup) he was toweled off by a member of the audience. Key enjoyed the lavish attention furnished by his male towel bearers at
the show I saw. He interviewed audience members over their bath-time proclivities. There was a part in the show where he has the audience put together a sentence one word at a time by each person in a row. Our audience group started with the word "strawberry banana". We ended up with a sentence about a person called Strawberry Banana. Key's improvised response to this was "If Vera Drake had been called Strawberry Banana it would have been a different story." True indeed.
I guess Key doesn't perform much (at all?) in New York so he's one to look out for at the Edinburgh Fringe and on tour in the UK.
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