12% Evil by Laurence Clarke
Tanya Raabe reviews Laurence Clark’s show at Arena Theatre Wolverhampton Dec 2007.
Laurence delivers us yet another ‘stand up’ or rather ‘sit down’ and ‘wheel about’ comedy show using his unique style of delivery.
Photo of Laurence Clak as Dr Strangelove by Andy Hollingworth
12% Evil explores whether, in this so-called PC generation, we still tend to stereotype disabled people as pitiable, brave, charity cases, invisible, comical, fakes, scroungers, etc. It takes its title from the many famous villains who were portrayed as disabled in order to make them seem sinister and evil; e.g Richard III, Long John Silver, Captain Hook, Dr Strangelove, various Bond baddies and… Heather Mills-McCartney!
In this show he looks at images that are fed to us in the media, film and story books and compares these with his own experiences. Seeing him self as 12% Evil. He only touches the surface with his comparisons and I could see a great deal more mileage using comedy in its extremes to dismember some of the stereotypes where they have now become archetypes and are grounded within disability culture.
If you’ve never seen a Laurence Clarke show then you may be in for a treat. He has a unique way of making you laugh at the absurdities of living in a disabling world. At first his use of statistics in a power point comedy show seemed predictable. It is a formula I’ve seen him use before, that I thought was quite dry and boring. But in this show Laurence takes it to another dimension with the introduction of short video clips. These present scenarios with him making a point about disability stereotypes. My favourite was the one where he is shaking a charity bucket. The bucket has various different causes on it to prove a point. That people will give money to a disabled person shaking a bucket no matter what …. well nearly anything. Money for his mortgage was one and you have to go to see the show for the punchline…..it is worth it.
Laurence’s shows always pull in big audiences and this was no exception. Although he got off to a slow start Laurence warmed up the audience and had them laughing in their seats with an appetite for more. The Laurence Clarke comedy experience offers a lot to both mainstream and disabled audiences. If you see your self as being more than 12% Evil then this is the show for you.
Disabled comic Laurence Clark’s stand-up show 12% Evil will be touring one last time this October and November. For further details go to www.laurenceclark.co.uk
The show combines stand-up comedy with fiendish hidden camera stunts to.explore whether we still stereotype disabled people as pitiable, brave, invisible, fakes, asexual, evil etc. It takes its title from the many famous villains who were portrayed as disabled in order to make them seem sinister and evil; e.g, Richard III, Long John Silver, Captain Hook, Dr Strangelove, various Bond baddies and… Heather Mills-McCartney!
11 October East Kilbride Arts Centre 01355261000
17 October Waterside Arts Centre - Trafford 01619125616
25 October Laurence Batley Theatre - Huddersfield 01484 430 528
26 October Southport Comedy Festival Southport Arts Centre 01704540011
4 November Hull Comedy Festival The Lamp 01482326131
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last updated: 2007-12-24 07:15:37
More by this author : Pig Tales by Julie McNamara It Hasn’t Happened Yet… by Liz Carr The Conquest of the South Pole by Theatre Resource DASh Film Festival 2008
tags : review disability arts theatre comedy