Poking holes in the conventions of comedy like the proverbial Matadoor, Asher Treleavan lances the expectations of an hour of stand-up show with his rapier wit, confident in his ability to make a joke and then highlight its construct.
Poking holes in the conventions of comedy like the proverbial Matadoor, Asher Treleavan lances the expectations of an hour of stand-up show with his rapier wit, confident in his ability to make a joke and then highlight its construct. Striding across the stage like “a powder covered Duke spouting witticisms” he proclaims the evening will be, “quite possibly the best post-modern show about racism featuring the poorest Spanish accent you will see at the comedy festival this year,” a low set bar that he clears with manic ease.
The very thing that makes Treleaven so funny is the thing that makes him difficult for some people to watch – his self-awareness. Pointing at the joke you just laughed at and explaining why it is a bad joke gives people the uneasy feeling that the joke is now on them, which it is, his goal is to show rather than tell. A trick he uses to great effect at the show’s opening, promising to attack the front few rows like other comedians would while unleashing a stream of profanities at them, giving you cause to think ‘Am I laughing at the idea of comedians insulting their audiences, as is common practice or I am just enjoying the swearing?”
It would be near impossible for Treleaven to reach the heady hilarity of last years Secret Door and unfair to expect, Matadoor is a different beast to stare down and a weightier topic to address. What happens and how do you react when you find yourself implicit in someone else’s racism. Do they think you are also racist? Should you correct them? How can you face down the bull of racism, or in Asher’s case sheep. The semantic implications of the word tolerate.
It all boils down to “Socially responsible comedy. . . and cock jokes,” in Asher’s summation of the show. He stalks and prances across the stage embodying the stories he is telling, from drunk teenage girls learning to walk in heels to the jungles of Thailand, he drags the audience along for the journey. A rangy,awkward man, he uses his physical space well, making the most of his gangly appearance.
A talent not to be ignored, Treleaven’s Matadoor stands defiantly and hilariously bold amongst the more tepid shows on offer this year, book tickets now.
