EdFringe Review: Funny Guy

Serial playwright and artist Patrick Nash’s ‘Funny Guy’ first had his towering neon-red marionette made and exhibited to much acclaim. Around this elemental creature, he has woven a tale of middle-class American life, their subconscious desires, the limits of charisma, and the double-edge sword of talent.

The story revolves around two couples: Dan (Jud Meyers) and Emma (Karen Genaro Dosanjh) and Bill (Jesse R. Tendler) and Margie (Clara Francesca). Dan’s the man who has it all, a design business, a proud wife, and a surety of his place in the world. Bill’s wife is on the verge of leaving him if he doesn’t get a better job. After some pestering, prompted by Margie, and delivered by Emma, Dan gives Bill some life advice. Unfortunately, it works.

Meyers measured gravitas, and impressive stage presence dominates from the get-go, a planet around which the others orbit – at first. Slowly but surely his ‘It-factor’ drips away, whilst Bill’s star rises. Where the comedy in Dan’s pre-fall era generally stems from Bill’s inadequacies, and Dan’s cutting, though not entirely unkind analyses of the others in his life. Post-fall, Dan becomes the joke.

Even before the titular ‘Funny Guy’ appears, this is an impressively stripped-down, but far from static piece of theatre. The dialogue is stylised, verging on the philosophical at times, but always to the point.

Emma’s consistent questioning of Dan as to what he earns, and his increasingly complex means of answering reveal the lies we, and our financial systems, tell ourselves to keep functioning. It’s both funny and insightful.

Dan’s interactions with Bill seem at first absurd, but fate as we know, is prone to making fickle choices. It’s the tragic comedy of life, boiled down to 55 minutes. Now this is a play which could be spoiled by an excess of explicit criticism.

I will say that the underlying theme is clear before the audience is slapped around the face with it. With another 10 minutes, maybe 15, the play’s philosophically monstrous aspect might be developed rather than parachuted in.

Otherwise ‘Funny Guy’ is a theatrical fable with a touch of class about it, in both word and performance. Audiences won’t soon forget it either.