By Robert Scucci
| Published
If you are not familiar with the Standing Comedy brand by Reuben Solo, you may not find yourself laughing with Glee during his last special, Please applaud. But if you are on the joke, or if you have at the very least followed the online presence of the Australian actor over the years, you will feel at home with his subversive postmodern staging brand which is almost too aware of yourself to be funny, but not so much in his ass that he loses his sense of humor. Operating as a spectacle to one man with a lot Public participation and audio drops intentionally placed with her technician, James, Reuben solo: please applaud is a special that deeply plunges into the profession of comedy itself, but does not have its welcome thanks to Solo’s desire to look at absurdity.
The frame of the program
Reuben solo: please applaud is presented as an arc of buyout for the actor, which was yelled last year on the scene during a America has a talent hearing. During the hearing, he struck the gold buzzer himself, to the indignation of Heidi Klum, Sofia VergaraHowie Mandel and Simon Cowell before the judges collectively give her the boot and told him that he was not funny. By examining the images of his disastrous performance, Reuben Solo finds himself in a deep depression and wondering if he should simply abandon his dream of being an actor.
Resolved to justify himself, he dresses in the same outfit he wore America has a talent And heads for the stage where his audience awaits him impatiently. At this point, you will wonder if Reuben Solo failed AGT hearing was only a configuration developed for Please applaud, Or if he really bombed before the judges and was inspired to produce this special in response to the poor reception he obtained for his waterfall.
I still do not know the answer to this question because the meta-hot Reuben solo: please applaud Go deep.
A little inside a little inside
Rife with intentionally placed false departures, jokes so bad that they are apparently designed to make the public uncomfortable when they do not have a role, and frequent interruptions of James, Reuben solo: please applaud Recalls the comedy of Bo Burnham in the sense that each aspect of the show must be meticulously repeated so that the light and sound gags are properly executed. At one point, Solo even responds to a call on his mobile phone before telling a member of the public that the call is in fact for them, to give them the phone and to punish them for having taken a phone call when registering his special.
After dragging the bit longer than any other actor would never dare, Solo is finally returned his phone, only to be informed by the same public member that he cannot use it during a recording, which encourages him to leave and let the man take his place on stage.
It continues … for a while.
Well-made anti-comedia
Mocking the public (and of itself) at each stage of the path, the “crowd work” of Reuben Solo Please applaud is also intentionally uncomfortable because when it finds a solid jump point for his humor, he uses gags like detection of developed lies signified by the buzzers, the blows and the red and green lights to indicate whether the members of the public are truthful in their answers to his apparently harmless questions. Whenever the solo returns on stage, he reprimands the cameraman, but only before asking James to assess the song before going to the next or trying desperately to give an asset.
Constantly worried about knowing if its microphone stand spoils the shooting, Reuben Solo works freely through his disaster of a set Please applaudWho culminates in a final joke based on the definition of Einstein’s madness which takes several passes to solve because he finds himself stuck in a loop that he does not know how to break, causing an existential crisis for all eyes to see until he ultimately sticks to landing (or not).
Not for everyone
Specials like Reuben solo: please applaud are not for everyone because you can’t just enjoy it as one-off Special stand-upBut rather an extension of the cannon and the tradition that Solo has established for his character on stage through his online presence over the years. There is simply too much wink and ahead of the head along the way to fully recover what he throws if you are not familiar with his work, and he delivers his comedy at such a frantic pace that it is difficult to follow if you do not know what you are committed to. However, if you have kept an eye on Reuben Solo, then Please applaud is an absolute treat for fans of anti-comedy because enjoying the joke means being totally in the joke before the special begins.
To date, you can watch Reuben solo: please applaud free on YouTube.
