The Waverley Bar
Aug 16-18, 20-25
22:15
I had the pleasure of bumping into the laudable, affable chap that is Dan Boerman at this year’s Fringe, & became quite affected by his genuinely sound soul. A very nice guy indeed. He’s over here in Edinburgh doing a full run of his debut show, about which experience he told me in an interview;
I did not anticipate how well it would go, and I’ve been very very lucky for a debut run. I haven’t had a night under 3/4 full. Every night has been packed out. On Saturdays I can’t move through the venue pre-show, and have had to hang out in the Men’s room. We’ve turned dozens of people away on the busy nights. Based on sales to date, we’ll have about a thousand punters through across the 21 nights, so I really want to make it a special evening!
So much for the hype, but what about the show? On turning 30 Dan has quite confidently announced thro’ his show title, ‘Quarter-life Crisis‘, that he expects to live to the age of 120. This lifespan lies just within the limits of modern human longevity (122 is the known record), and is also acknowledged in the Siddha tradition of South India, which believes that if we generally take fifteen breaths a minute (21,600 a day), we could live for a period of at least 120 years. Thing is, I don’t think Dan can pace his breathing out like that, he’s a very natural orator who clearly enjoys performing in front of us – he’s just beaming smiles up there, just buzzing off the energy of performing.
I had three lifebelts to myself, I was the safest man on the plane
As for the comedy, well it’s an eclectic pick & mix of material as Dan casts his slightly eccentric, but extremely astute eye upon the world about him. Some of his arrows hit me directly in the oesophagus, unleashing a loud bellyburp of laughter; some kinda grazed my skin with a giggle, & one or two flew reyt over my head. It was in his crowdwork, however, that Dan truly shined. He manages to wrap a big arm around us all, rendering us comfy as fuck as he digs into us for material, bouncing off everything with extremely swift & undeniable wit.
Context is everything with a rotisserie chicken
It’s only relatively recently that Dan has turned to comedy, & he definitely has a gift for it, & star quality – but he’s a bit of an unpolished diamond at the moment. Saying that, just reading his interview show’d me the rapidity & strength of his comedy mind, & I’m looking forward to seeing him blossom further & catch him again at the Fringe, hopefully next year, when he’ll have a world’s heap of new material to cast his creative eyes over.
themumble.uk 