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Ross Noble is a sight to be seen, his self-described ‘comedy on an acid trip’ show is an experience unlike most other shows to be rolled out during Melbourne International Comedy Festival (MICF). Noble feeds his comedy largely from his own minds creations, drawing most his material from his immediate observations of audience members, hecklers and even his own stage crew.
Standing affront an almost alien-meets-ebola virus themed set, the background has little involvement in Noble’s act, acting complementary to the complete randomness that comes from the British comedians surrealist mouth.
Noble is one of the only comedic characters that can fill the grand halls of the Palais Theatre. The effortless style of how Noble weaves his mix of personal anecdotes and his other musings throughout the act is always clever and natural.
Most experienced Noble fans will know that being in the front row of his stand-up comedy almost assures involvement in his stand-up, from the out-of-work ‘data connection’ professional, the gentleman with two pairs of spectacles and the shifty pirates in the corner.
One feature of Noble’s comedy that has been constant over the years is in the second half routine, where examines the presents and letters that has been left on the stage- a segment that further reaffirms his pseudo rockstar status.
Noble’s comparison with his way of speaking to a crazed loon at the train station is far too accurate and audience members were often brought together in their confusion of where his act would go next.
Yet, amongst the non-sensible ramblings, some of Ross’s act were unexpectedly insightful, with his comparison of older women with breast implants with a men having babies arms, which he so hilariously impersonated, to the idiocy of anti-Islam sentiments.
If the audience can withstand some of the crazy concoctions of Nobles mind from blue whale sex advice, his anti-semitic juice-wanting daughter and ‘Spiders: the musical’, the show is worth seeing if only for Noble’s doppelganger Historian Neil Oliver impression alone.
Over the past ten years Noble has become a permanent fixture on the MICF program, and while the style and format of his comedy hasn’t changed, if it’s not broke, why fix it?
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Tangentleman
Ross Noble
Palais Theatre
14- 18 April 2015
Melbourne International Comedy Festival
March 25 – April 19
