Nothing to do with John Edwards, ‘Crossing Over’ was an interesting pair up, Festival veteran Chris North teaming up long time comedy nerd Dom Romeo to present stand up, song and sketches. Add the talent of Julia Clark to the mix and you had a fun hour of comedy.
Chris began the show with some introductory warm up in which his experience in stand up and radio was brought to the fore. A seasoned performer from Sydney, this spot and a later extended spot of stand up demonstrated his ease on stage, professional delivery and slick commercial radio voice. A couple of parody songs went over swimmingly and were obviously an integral tool of his trade.
Chris was soon joined by Dom for the first of their parody songs. Performed to a backing track, the gist of these tunes was apparent from the outset and there was little surprise in the direction they were heading. They got plenty of laughs from the recognition factor and played around with language with great results. Chris had the slightly better voice than Dom but they both delivered the lyrics with gusto. There was some vocal impersonation thrown in, but that was the extent of the joke. They cast their net wide in terms of appealing to different demographics; the opener was full of impenetrable text speak to bewilder older folks while another sketch featured TV jingles only familiar to those over thirty.
The token female for the show, Julia performed a ten minute set. Her presence was a wonderful contrast the slightly blokey (mainly Chris’ influence) and geeky (Dom’s obvious contributions) material which was to follow. This Londoner presented some expected gear on Australia but it was mostly a bracket of perky yet bitchy and cynical material which had the audience cackling throughout. She played up on the “how could this lovely young lady have such vicious thoughts” angle perfectly.
Next up were sketches and songs by the boys that tackled various social topics. There were a few routines in which Chris took the spotlight, performing the bulk of the bit. It as possibly due to his inexperience that Dom was given the supporting roles but he handled this task well.
Dom then took to the stage for his moment of glory. Despite his limited stage experience he went over well. His material, that of being single, in his late thirties and a nerd, struck a chord with many in the room and his confident delivery guaranteed laughter. His adeptness with stagecraft even extended to interacting with members of the audience, not actually mining them for material but as a way of involving the punters in his stories. Colour me impressed.
This was an entertaining hour featuring three solid performers. There were plenty of topics included to keep everyone amused and laughing.
For booking details visit the Comedy Festival website