Paul T Davies reviews Best Man at Underbelly presented as part of the Edinburgh Fringe.
Best ManUnderbelly, Edinburgh Fringe4 Stars Book Tickets Welcome to the Best Man speech at the kind of wedding we’ve all been to! Cathal is ready to give his speech, but he’s lost it, so he’ll just talk off the cuff He’s the only single man left among his friendship group and his despair and bitterness begin to crash through. Created by Mikey Fleming and Colman Hayes, this is a hilarious hour full of Irish charm and great writing. Hayes is brilliant as the Best Man, using the audience as, among others, the happy couple, John and Rebecca. He riffs on their responses so the show will be different every time, and it’s a lively mix of script and improvisation. My only criticism is that he can’t be seen by most of the audience when he goes to the floor, especially at the end when he breaks down. This is the venue, so perhaps show more of that despair before descending! That aside, this is an hour that grabs you in a boozy hug and you don’t even mind!
Paul is a playwright, director, actor, academic, (he has a PhD from the University of East Anglia), teacher and theatre reviewer! His plays include Living with Luke, (UK tour 2016), Play Something, (Edinburgh Festival Fringe/Drayton Arms Theatre, London 2018), , (2019), and now The Miner’s Crow, which won the inaugural Artist’s Pick of the Fringe Award at the first ever Colchester Fringe Festival 2021. In lockdown 2020 he created the audio series Isolation Alan, available on Youtube, and performed online in the Voice Box Festival. He is the founder member of Stage Write, a Colchester based theatre company, and his acting roles include Rupert in How We Love by Annette Brook, first performed at the Vaults Festival 2020 and revived at the Arcola and at Theatre Peckham in 2021. Follow: @stagewrite_
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