Like many others at the moment, Rhod Gilbert is previewing new material and I was lucky enough to get hold of some tickets for a show not too far from here. It is not possible to review properly, simply because we were not given polished material, but in terms of delivering on a promise, well we were told there would be some stuff that worked and some that didn’t and I have to say there is little I felt fell short.
The evening was every bit as hilarious as you would expect; I have mentioned previously how much I actually enjoy the preview shows because I really like the raw, unrehearsed feel. I also like the way you could easily see every show of the run and never see the same thing twice, although having worked as hard as I did to get tickets to this one I do not think I could endure the process too many times to risk finding out for sure!
I will not go into any detail on the material, as this would spoil things when the show is finally cut together, but I would say little needs changing in my opinion. I was quite struck at the irony of spending two hours listening to someone rant about how they no longer feel the need to rant, but I really do not think it would be the same if he were to perform any other way, so I hope he hasn’t really mellowed as much as he claims! It is a vital part of the character we all see him as that we get to ridicule his response to things as well as recognising the nonsense of the situation he describes.
Some of what he delivered did not feel new to me, so I spent much of my time thinking “When did I hear him do that before?” – but this is more a sign of my fangirl nature than that he is not delivering on a promise of completely new material. I do make a huge effort to catch every TV and radio performance and even a writer as hard-working as Gilbert could not possibly come up with the vast amount of material needed to make every single performance unique.
So there you are; I would say your chance to see a preview show has probably passed unless new dates are announced as tickets sell quickly, but keep an eye on Rhod’s website for announcements of the main tour and definitely make the effort to go along – although if you are reading this blog, you will no doubt be doing that anyway whether I tell you to or not…
There are many of Rhod's performances to be found on youtube, but I particularly love this one!
And this is on my Christmas list, since my seperate copies have vanished!
Or you can pre-order the DVD of this new material, due for release in time for next Christmas:
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