Best of British

By Alanta Colley

The Best of British offers a veritable smorgasbord of British talent; touting the quirks and charms of the Mother Country’s funny folk. This is a good place to get along to if you wish to find out what the British find funny about Australia.

The show offers a comedy taster for those wanting to sample comics before committing to a full hour with just one of them.  Those in the line-up all have shows on elsewhere as part of the Comedy Festival.

While the line-up varies nightly, on this particular night we were graced with the comedy of Tom Binns of ‘IT Crowd’ Fame. Binns shared with us his persona of DJ Ivan Brackenbury; host to Hospital Radio FM, who performed hilariously inappropriate song dedications to a litany of patients in the hospital. He was uproariously entertaining.

Geoff Boyz represented Scotland on the night; with an eclectic array of observational humour and impersonations. The inherently affable Gordon Southern was a true highlight of the night; providing a particularly British interpretation of the character of Australia’s geography. Southern’s analysis of Australia’s obsession with AFL cut to the core of our National psyche. Southern’s potted history of the colonial invasions of America then Australia was clever and concise.

I’m not sure how it was all coordinated, but the vast majority of the people in the audience were also British. While the show delivered an expected cocktail of jokes about being drunk, Post-colonial jibes about cricket, and bawdy one-liners about wives and women, it exceeded expectations.

The all-male nature of the line-up was a little boring; I’m pretty sure the UK has lady comedians as well. Aside from this the night was a little like a kebab, solid, delicious, and pleasurable in its predictability. A worthy addition to your comedy consumption this festival.

Best of British is on at The Exford Hotel until April 20
http://www.comedyfestival.com.au/2014/season/shows/best-of-british