This show was a slow-motion train wreck, unfolding piece by piece to the ever-increasing horror and disbelief of the audience.
It all started off on the wrong foot when an audience member refused to help Asher on stage by holding a pinata. When Asher tried to speak to the same man a little later in the show, the audience member and his partner promptly stood up and left. “Well fuck you then!” Asher screamed after them. Pretty tough to win an audience back after that, but damned if he didn’t give it his best shot. But win us back to what? The show was so wildly unfocused that it’s difficult to remember much of what transpired, beyond the overwhelming feeling that it was repeatedly unpleasant. At one point Asher said: “Well, we’re halfway through the show … it’s been a tough sixty-five minutes.” and I had to fight the urge to ask if we could get up and leave as well. I must admit, by the end of the show I was laughing uproariously, but by that stage I’m not sure if I was laughing at the jokes themselves or how terribly surreal they had become in their awfulness.
Asher himself is a wonderfully engaging personality and a has a great stage presence, but it was clear that even he knew the show was derailing badly, and he merely compounded the error by aggressively placing the blame on the audience. As he pounded back Bacardi Breezer after Bacardi Breezer, he got wilder and wilder as his face got redder. There was some small fascination in waiting to see just what extreme he’d go to next in order to win the audience back, but overall it’s tough to describe the show as anything other than an unmitigated disaster. It’s tempting to think that perhaps the comic just had a bad start that he never recovered from, but I suspect the harsher reality is that it just didn’t have the jokes or the substance to sustain itself for the length of the show. Not recommended.
For more info and booking details fo to Asher Treleaven – Open Door