Rob Auton is one of those performers who refuses to fit neatly into a category. I first encountered him when I nominated him for Dave's Joke Of the Fringe back in 2013. He won* but you'd hardly describe him as a stand-up comedian. He's part-poet, part-artist, part-wistful dreamer. Previous show themes have included the colour yellow, time, hair and the sky. The theme in this show is Rob Auton.
In the long-haired Yorkshireman's latest show we really find out who Rob Auton is. It feels as if this is the show he has been working towards all these years. You would never call a Rob Auton show conventional, but through a mixture of poetry and thought-spinning we do get to learn much more about the actual person. This is definitely his most accessible, personal show to date and all the better for it.
And Auton is still full of surprises. Who would have thought that for a while he worked in the hard sell world of advertising, coming up with snappy slogans and visuals. Maybe it is less surprising that his career in advertising did not exactly pan out, and when we see and hear about some of his hilarious proposals for campaigns maybe we can understand why he was more suited to comedy.
There are tales of his faltering cricket career and an early success in cookery, becoming the "crabcake king". He is no blunt Yorkshireman. There is heartfelt passion too, as he talks of his love at first sight meeting with his future wife.
His style is chilled out and underplayed as he draws you in effortlessly with a neat turn of phrase here, a quirky yet insightful observation there. He looks like a cross between a romantic poet and Robinson Crusoe after a year on a desert island. No wonder dogs eye him with suspicion. The stage is eyecatching too, bedecked with large backdrops from his previous shows.
If you've never seen Auton before, this is the perfect introduction. You'll laugh a lot, you'll smile a lot and, mark my words, you'll want to see him again. One of my favourite shows this year.
Until August 26. Buy tickets here.
Read more reviews here.
five stars
*“I heard a rumour that Cadbury is bringing out an oriental chocolate bar. Could be a Chinese Wispa.”
