Edinburgh Fringe Comedy reviews: Ayoade Bamgboye | Should Statements | Grace Mulvey | Saaniya Abbas + more

Ayoade Bamgboye: Swings and Roundabouts

Pleasance Courtyard (Venue 33)

★★★★☆

In truth, I don't think Ayoade Bamgboye's Fringe debut is fully formed. But given its subject matter and her charmingly vaulting ambition, that's eminently allowable. Besides, the Nigerian stand-up is a mercurial talent, one of those acts in whom you immediately intuit far greater things for her in the future. As indeed, she has herself. Growing up with a desire for political high office or to be a peerless liar, the twists and turns of her tale are worthy of the multiple Oscar-nominated director that once sacked her.

Although she opens by speaking of personal epiphany, she bookends her show with the most quotidian scene imaginable, simply observing a fellow supermarket customer failing to get an assistant to help him. Vicariously here for the mini-drama, Bamgboye imbues the everyday moment with mysterious significance.

And it's the delivery rather than the subject matter that's so striking. Launching into some delightfully antagonistic bits of business with her tech, professorially adjusting her glasses for emphasis, she is enchanted by the English language, metaphorically exploring its finer distinctions in the unlikely manner of a football fan cheering their team through a tournament.

Declaring her heartfelt devotion to idiom, enthusing about the peculiar folk sayings of these islands, she nevertheless displays her absolute mastery of such coinage, with three or four of the most exquisitely pressed phrase formulations you'll ever hear in your life. The simultaneous vulnerability, majesty and humour captured in a wildlife simile expressing the racism she's encountered since arriving in the UK, well, it takes your breath away.

With Bamgboye utterly owning the stage and yet, ultimately, confessing the most terrible lows, Swings and Roundabouts is a ride that plumbs the depths. But it always feels on a triumphant if unpredictable trajectory, especially when it tangentially and madly departs into recreating popular British crime drama or just teasingly probes the audience about their identities, making them consider them afresh.

JAY RICHARDSON

until 24 August

Should Statements: A Show Brought to You by (a little) Inherited Wealth

Laughing Horse @ City Cafe (Venue 85)

★★★☆☆

The prohibitive cost of appearing at the Edinburgh Fringe and its disenfranchising nature is a subject that's never far from many performers' thoughts. So, in a limited run, in a small, karaoke booth Free Festival venue, Lizzie Simpson has taken a huge gamble by funding her show with the legacy of her late uncle, the benefits for her stand-up career far from guaranteed. For a financially insecure, working-class performer it's certainly no small consideration. Yet despite belatedly raising the issue as narrative jeopardy, it doesn't really inhibit her gleefully ribald set.

Darkly, breezily she discloses her sexual predilections, body issues and other family inheritances, like being the youngest child of six and growing up without a bedroom to call her own. Likening herself to Lena Dunham, if only physically, the Milton Keynes-ian comic nevertheless shares a willingness with the Girls creator to explore the messiness of relationships. Though still less-than-surreptitiously reading from notes when I caught it, and inviting a guest act to perform a 10-minute spot near the start, Should Statements confirms that Simpson ought to have a future in comedy with a fair wind behind her. Let her uncle's passing not have been in vain.

JAY RICHARDSON

until 12 August

READ MORE: Comedian Holly Spillar on how working class artists are disappearing from the Fringe

Grace Mulvey: Did You Hear We’re All Going to Die?

The Crate at Assembly George Square (Venue 8)

★★★☆☆

Irish people have always been better at death than the English, argues Grace Mulvey cheerfully. She’s had more experience of mortality than most – not just because her parents took her to loads of funerals as a kid, but also because she’s lost a few family members to the same genetic condition.

You’d be forgiven for expecting a show with this theme to be heavy going, but this skips along thanks to Mulvey’s likeably chatty style and easy wit, peppered with a millennial’s observations on life events such as weddings, children and dating.

There are times when one rather wishes she’d dig deeper into thoughts of mortality, the way we plan for death and the fascinating traditions surrounding wakes, for example. But that’s clearly not what she’s going for and she purposefully keeps it light – just as her father does during an impromptu and memorable conversation about his will.

A sub-theme, her attempts to lose weight (driven by a desire to be healthy), is fertile ground for some enjoyably relatable stories; one jaw-dropper of an anecdote – involving an encounter with a personal trainer – cries out for more detail and time. You might even argue that we have two shows squashed into one here, but it’s still a lot of fun.

ASHLEY DAVIES

until 24 August

Saaniya Abbas – Hellarious

Gilded Balloon Patter House (Venue 24)

★★★☆☆

Sporting cat ears, flirtatiously addressing men in her audience as “cutie” and attracting boys less than half her age, the diminutive Saaniya Abbas looks like butter wouldn't melt in her mouth. And often, onstage, it doesn't. As a newish Indian comic living and working in Dubai, she's restricted in what material she can perform. But as a Haram Muslim educated in a Catholic convent, with her stand-up start tied to her physically-inhibited marriage and divorce from a British man, she's got plenty to say about the friction between religion, gender, sex and relationships, informed by the international perspective of her burgeoning career.

Newly dating in her 30s and intimidated by the apps, niches and fetishes, Abbas is sex and alcohol-positive, even without a genetic disposition for the latter. Introducing herself to American audiences has been a tricky balance in the wake of 9/11. But she's not insensitive to the UK's rise in Islamophobia either. And as a lapsed Muslim, she doesn't want to be seen as an ex-Muslim, remaining culturally stamped by her upbringing. Having gone through big personal upheaval in a short period of time, this fast-adapting, rapidly developing newcomer has abundant potential.

JAY RICHARDSON

until 25 August

KC Shornima: Detachment Style

Pleasance Courtyard (Venue 33)

★★★☆☆

A writer for Saturday Night Live, with all the slickness that implies, KC Shornima's got the makings of a fine Fringe stand-up debut here. But clocking in at a perfunctory 45 minutes, it's still very much work-in-progress, with the Asian-American comedian struggling to link her anecdotes satisfyingly. She's not short of gritty backstory to draw upon, with her and her sister initially left behind in the Nepalese civil war when their parents fled to the US. And she's archly funny on the perils and possibilities of dating a younger man from a different ethnic background, especially when venturing abroad.

But she makes few concessions to tweaking her cultural references for UK audiences. And her jaded self-perceptions are invariably introduced with her simply waving the white flag of defeat, affording her routines little opportunity to truly grow or surprise. That's unfortunate, because encompassing serial killers, porn, her inadvertent appropriation of toxic masculinity and her desire for physically aggressive sex, there's seemingly plenty of darkness for her to dredge up. And it could facilitate some real edginess, if only she could sustain it by forging a stronger initial connection with the crowd.

JAY RICHARDSON

until 24 August

READ MORE: Five Edinburgh Fringe performers on the true life stories behind their shows

Nathan Cassidy: It's Not The End Of The World

Counting House (Venue 170)

★★★☆☆

Since the Dead Dad show arrived to win prizes in comedy, few have been as deeply moving (even if briefly) as Nathan Cassidy's. And he is talking about his step-dad and he isn't even dead! He breaks down the show for us right at the top and assures us that, whether or not we think so, this is funny stuff. He is a powerful force on stage. It is impressive watching him work a room that is subdued at first and take it with him until we are all enthusiastically playing Alan Carr's Picture Slam at the end.

Although, as the title of the show says, “it's not the end of the world”, Nathan finds much that would suggest that that might be no bad thing. Everything from Instagram to the last train from Brighton, Prince Andrew, England football fans and silenced scaffolders is grist to Nathan's opinion mill. And life, he thinks, is going to get worse. Having said which, fans of the Lib Dems in general, and Ed Davey in particular, are in for a treat. Fans of Alan Carr, and his Picture Slam, not so much.

KATE COPSTICK

until 24 August

Double Deprecation

Uno Mas (Venu 219)

★★☆☆☆

I am flyered for this show and assured that it is very self-deprecating humour. At the risk of sounding glib, the show has a fair bit to be self-deprecating about. I suspect both performers are very nervous.

Freddie Hill is the better of the pair of newbies sharing the bill. When he has the courage of his nicely, cleverly ironic material, he will be a pleasure to laugh with. He is an impressive wordsmith and handles ironic mansplaining and sexism smartly. I believe both comics just need more gigs under their belts and I look forward to seeing them in the future.

KATE COPSTICK

until 11 August

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