Last Updated on October 11, 2024
Clever, silly, delightful comic alchemy in Soho
Fresh from a successful Edinburgh run, Ikechukwu Ufomadu’s solo hour is funny, bizarre and thoroughly entertaining. Clever and silly in equal measure, Amusements is a tightly written set that demonstrates a strange and delightful kind of comic alchemy: one that turns bemusement into amusement.
There is a moment during Amusements when Ikechukwu Ufomadu suggests questions we might have in the audience: “What is this? What am I witnessing?” I must admit, these queries did cross my mind when, at one point, Ufomadu took out a book of Shakespeare’s sonnets, and announced that he would be reading Sonnet 63. However, once he starts, all we hear are indecipherable grunts and melodic mumbling. Ufomadu puts as much expression and emotion into his wordlessness as most actors put into their actual lines. When he is done, he closes the book and says: “Sorry, I forgot to put my glasses on.”
To call this show stand-up would be to misdescribe it. The show is, admittedly, one person making jokes on a stage in front of an audience, and it is laugh-out-loud funny throughout. However, there is also singing, dancing, PowerPoint displays and other undefinable segments that deliver more than one would expect at your average comedy club.
Ufomadu assures us that he is merely playing a comedian. It is, therefore, appropriately performed in a theatre rather than a club, and Amusements does feel more like a piece of theatre than anything else. Ufomadu is a tremendous actor; the versatility of his voice, especially, allows him to inhabit various comic characters with finesse. Some jokes are told only with his eyes, orbs of fun that deserve a whole set of their own.
The only downside to the space is that, at times, the room does not feel crowded enough. While in a busier club room, Ufomadu may have had the audience in the palm of his hand, here the relationship took longer to build. Those familiar with Stewart Lee will know that he takes a whole set to get to his absurdist moment: when he repeats a movement or a line over and over until the audience is in hysterics, and the slightest variation sets off raucous laughter. Ufomadu boldly does not wait until the end of his set, when the audience is primed to let loose. Rather, he dots these moments of humour-by-repetition throughout. I am a sucker for this kind of comedy but, I imagine, its success is dependent on the room.
Ufomadu’s performance is fast-paced and jam-packed with jokes – a bullet train of a show that allows you just enough time to appreciate each stop, before whizzing you on to the next. When the show ended and we left the theatre, I half-wished that it was only the interval.
The publicity says this show is ‘rigorously nonsensical’. Not only is that worryingly close to how my supervisor described my university dissertation, but it is also a delightfully accurate description of Amusements. I suggest that the reverse phrase is equally true: Amusements is ‘nonsensically rigorous’.
Amusements is light relief from an upsetting world. There are no rambling personal stories or political observations. There is an (intentionally) tense moment when Ufomadu declares he is about to launch into a serious moment of political discussion (made all the more tense in the context of the Soho Theatre’s recent stand-up debacle). Without spoiling the absurd punchline, it suffices to say that Ufomadu does not talk about politics.
The show is everything it says it will be – bizarre, nonsensical, and very funny. It is, also, a strangely wholesome event in which the audience is left with nothing but warmth for Ufomadu and his characters, plus a moderate dose of confusion. An hour rushes by.
Amusements by Ikechukwu Ufomadu is at the Soho Theatre until Saturday 2nd March. Buy tickets here.
Soho Theatre
21 Dean St,
London
W1D 3NE
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