Review: Josie Long: Romance and Adventure – Star & Shadow Cinema, Newcastle
Josie Long
Josie Long’s unique brand of comedy has earned her a solid place in the lineup of stand-ups working in the UK.
Her approach to form and structure – definitely present, and motivated towards a goal, but never strict or contrived – conceals a carefully considered set of ideas.
Anyone who saw last year’s show will know that Long is pretty unhappy with the current government, and that theme continues with Romance and Adventure.
The audience are handed DIY ‘zines as they come into the venue, featuring hand-drawn images of Ed Milliband; some music and political websites that Long recommends; and a bar graph depicting the relative quantities of Godzilla, Extreme Sports, Silly Voices, and Unicorns to expect within the show.
Long introduces herself from the back of the room, feigning an attempt to conceal her identity, and then takes to the stage. Unfortunately she doesn’t even get as far as warning the audience about her love of swearing before she drops the C-bomb (not conservative – the other one).
She then spends 25 minutes warming up the room, before introducing her support act Grace Petrie, a folk singer-songwriter from Leicester.
Petrie tells tales of love and anger, twisted with clever wordplay into punchy songs, and delivered in a beautiful voice with the perfect mix of fragility and power.
Josie’s 2012 tour, as she reminds us, is called Romance and Adventure, although it only features one mention of romance, and very little adventure. She doesn’t really tell jokes, or even perform routines – rather, her shows are a mixture of fluid ideas, character-based skits, improvisation, and the occasional situational mime. Some microphone stand-based prop gags and other surprises are thrown in, and added to her usual range of “needlessly put-on voices” is a film noir pastiche, performed using Jay-Z lyrics as a script.
This show is a whirlwind tour of long-distance relationships; old fashioned aristocratic pursuits; marriage; the novels of Alistair Gray & Kurt Vonnegut; the Spice Girls; Dalston; things to do before you’re 30; the Isle of Sheppy (in Kent); Dennis Skinner MP; Lesbian sailors; a daschund called Maurice; MSN live; Logan’s Run; a disproportionate number of stories about fruit; Virgin cola…and some politics.
She’s not afraid to let a few jokes fail, or hit a niche subset of the audience – in fact, she describes those moments as “some you time” for those who don’t understand the references.
Anyone who has enjoyed Josie’s brand of comedy before will be impressed as she’s honed her onstage personality, as well as her material. There are one or two re-used punch lines, but you’d never notice them if you hadn’t seen last year’s effort. All in all, another impressive showing from Josie Long.
