Words by Suzy Romer
Spending an hour with Darren Harriott is as relaxing and entertaining as a great conversation with friends. His warm, easy-going manner has the audience laughing from his first words and before we know it, we are threading in and out of stories about his childhood and his current life in London. He constantly surprises us into laughter with his original viewpoint and adds a refreshing dash of common sense to unexamined cultural norms.
His flow and engaging energy never falter, which is a stunning achievement for a comic who presented his first full-length show at the Fringe last year. He talks about his experiences with an open simplicity of emotion that I have rarely seen, or rather felt. He deals with the difficult subjects of absent fathers and teenage gangs so that everyone in the audience can live the stories with him rather than merely glimpse an unrecognisable Other Life. He keeps his audience with him all the time by explaining references that different age groups might not get and we laugh together and at ourselves, not at each other. Darren Harriott combines intelligence and depth with a lightness of touch and flawless professionalism. I couldn’t ask for more.
Catch Darren Harriott: Visceral at The Pleasance Courtyard at 9.30pm througout August.
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