Clusterf**k” was marketed with little fanfare – described in the posters as a “two star show”, it was the first ‘big’ ComedySoc show of this year. With the promise of elections candidates being given a chance to be on stage, the auditorium was packed.
With a mix of improvisation and sketches, it was fresh and exciting throughout. Not only did the show have lots of jokes perfectly in tone with the student audience, it was written entirely by students and twisted traditional stereotypes. This was done brilliantly in ‘Coming Out’ where a teenager predictably comes out…as straight to his gay parents. There were also bollocks involved.
They also managed to refresh older jokes – ‘Robothatcher’ gave a great new take on Tory/northerner bashing, while ‘Coffee Shop’ was the traditional sketch but with coffee beverages based on dictators. A narration of the ‘Solar System’ also had some brilliant moments, and the sketch about a ‘Gangster PM’ also received a great reaction from the crowd. The best line of the night has to go to the bizzare ‘Pitch Noire’, which ended on the outstandingly funny line “Honey kill my kids, I’ve got more important things to do now”.
The best piece of the night is a tough one to pick, the standard of the show was stunningly brilliant, but ‘Facebook’ was up there; it was student-relevant, intelligent and fantastically played by Jed Marshall and star of the show Liam Webber. His ability to produce lively physical comedy managed to genuinely take some parts of the show from mediocre to hilarious.
Not only were sketches on the whole brilliant, but the improv also went down a treat; taking the structure of TV show ‘Whose Line Is It Anyway?’ whilst engaging the audience well (with some bribery to help). Again Liam Webber was standout but no ComedySoc performer let themselves down. They all helped make ‘Clusterf**k’ a side-splitting show.
For all this praise, there were some misses which seemed slow and contrived, but the hits were so laugh-out-loud funny that it would be very difficult for any audience member to have left disappointed. With a stunning finale (see image), ‘Clusterf**k may very well be the funniest thing I’ll ever see at uni. It was a great example of what student comedy should be.
