Shazia Mirza, a comedian with a long history at the Fringe, here presents a work in progress of her new material. She discusses the hypocrisy and prejudice with which she is treated as an Asian female comedian in Britain and explores the idea of the offensive in comedy and its inherent absurdity.
It is evident which parts of this show are in progress, and Mirza is a veteran comedian who will doubtless catch parts that aren’t working from this Fringe run and quickly turn them around to a well-constructed set. As it stands however, this show suffers from repetition of the same ideas, and, on the night I saw it at least, an often shaky and low-energy delivery. Once Mirza hits her stride with each set-piece, you can see her experience shine through, and there are some truly funny moments despite the unfinished nature of the show.
Her scathing manner towards the audience is either funny or, on occasion, makes her seem uncaring about her set and the reactions to it. Regardless, her talent and quick wit are very clear in her spontaneous reactions on the night. Some of the jokes of a more ‘offensive’ nature don’t quite land, and the bigger laughs come from Mirza’s more innocuous material, the butt of the more offensive jokes being unclear.
The final and seemingly most developed section of this show is sincerely striking, and demonstrates the fascinating direction that Mirza is trying to follow – which, if executed well, could develop into a first-rate, thought-provoking and important piece of comedy, theatre – or a hybrid of the two.
However, as it stands, it has a few flaws. The facts that Mirza exposes around Islam and its history, as related to our culture, are sincerely fascinating but they are not necessarily comedic, and she does not really add this dimension herself. If this seriousness is her intention, she needs to say so more explicitly in order to achieve the full power of the section.