geezer goes out... - for a comedy experience Richard Herring - The Headmaster's Son
Schooldays are not necessarily the best days of your life, not if the bloke in charge of the school is also your Dad. That's the premise of RichardHerring's latest one-man show (well, one-boy show really), based on his not quite ordinary education at the Kings of Wessex School in Cheddar. Richard was a swotty well-behaved kid in a blazer, who thankfully kept all his teenage ephemera filed away in boxes and wrote down his daily adolescent musings in a diary. Perfectly normal behaviour (matches my life experience, anyway), and perfect material for a 75 minute stand-up monologue. I was won over when Richard described going to school carrying a briefcase and a musical instrument as a "Buckaroo of bullying". He also spent rather a lot of time dwelling on the obsessions of a trying to go out with girls, and then trying (with increasing frustration) to do things with girls once you were going out with them. A fair proportion of the show grubbed along at a rather crude level, which was only appropriate given what teenage boys tend to think about. The audience, most of whom had been of schoolgoing age in the early 80s, nodded sagely when Richard expressed carnal desires for Janet Ellis off Jigsaw. This had proved slightly embarrassing earlier in the week when Ms Ellis was sat in the audience, but last night's show slid by with no such misfortunes. A fine performance all round, from a comedian still coming to terms with no longer being as famous as he once was. He's at the Leicester Square Theatre for one more week (and well chuffed at selling the place out last night), then off on a tour in non-huge venues all around the country. Don't take your Dad, especially if he's a retired headmaster. [review][review][review][review][review][review] [Rich's review of last night][my review from 5 years ago] [Richard's daily blog, 2002-2009]
geezer goes out... - for a comedy experience
