Sometimes, the best comedy comes from heartache and lived experiences, this is the approach taken by Lew Fitz, in new comedy hour; Soft Lad, playing at the Gilded Balloon Teviot venue this Edinburgh Fringe.
Fitz’s keenly observational style of comedy does a good job of capturing the Northern voice. Originally from Manchester, Fitz hilariously describes day to day life in the city. It is the female voice that is particularly well represented, with the ‘Pats’ and ‘Margarets’ sounding like they’ve just walked off of Coronation Street.
In Soft Lad, Fitz walks us through a life filled with disappointments, from being kicked off a sports team to moving to London and feeling out of depth at endless dinner parties. There’s comedy in the tragedy, but a tinge of sadness too.
Fitz is a very engaging performer, and makes a concerted effort to connect with everyone in the room. This turns out to be a double edged sword, the tone is very conversational, so when you have a particularly quiet audience, such as the one at this performance, it makes the job all the harder for Fitz.
But even a flat audience can’t take away from how funny Lew Fitz: Soft Lad actually is, and while the occasional joke fails to land, even our reserved audience were laughing heartily throughout.
It’s only in its final moments that Soft Lad starts to lose its way, with an ending that comes without being adequately set up, or fully explained and explored. Aside from its possible overreliance on audience cooperation, and an unsatisfactory conclusion, this is a very decent show from a comedian with plenty of potential.
