Tim Vine’s aptly named show “Punslinger” is unlike anything you’ll see at this year’s festival. This is rapid fire, quick wit humour witch will leave you exhausted and bewildered. To give you an idea of what this man is capable of, he once held the record for the most amount of jokes told in an hour (499), so when he warns you that it’s just “this” for a hour, he’s not kidding!
You may have seen Tim on the creatively named, award winning UK sketch show “The Sketch Show”, and you can just about picture any of his jokes working as a short sketch.
Tim walks onto the stage dressed as a cowboy, and as the audience tries to work out what this guy’s all about, you can almost see a tumbleweed role across the stage. But once the audience warms up to the whole one-liner concept, this lone-ranger soon becomes the town hero. Advanced Wordplay is the name of the game here, and as clever as most of the wordplay is, some of the jokes achieve more of a cringey moan than a laugh, not unlike the reaction a bad dad joke might achieve. But Tim quickly fires back with something stronger.
The onslaught of puns can be exhausting, and I found myself finding it hard to keep up at times, a quicker mind might get twice as much out of this show than I did. But rest assured, there is some relief from the pun-fire in the form of musical comedy, ridiculous stunts (look out for “pen behind the ear”, gold), audience participation and an endless bag full of visual puns.
Admittedly, this show isn’t for everyone, but if you’re a fan of the ridiculous “Little Brittan” style UK comedy and up for something completely unique, give this a shot.
Energetic, unique, and hilariously ridiculous, Tim Vine in pun-toting and trigger-happy.
For more info or booking details go to Tim Vine – Punslinger