We’ve all been there. We’ve all seen a stand-up show that makes some interesting observation, and we’ve thought, “I wonder if that’s true, it would be cool to test it.” Most of haven’t gone and coded an entire app for it, but that is what Sean Morely has done. Daniel Kitson claimed that stand-up comedy has an inherent power imbalance between performer and viewers that makes audience participation unethical. Sean Morely found a way to right that balance and see what happens. Then he really committed to the bit. It’s a fascinating experiment.
It’s hard to create something truly original in today’s oversaturated comedy landscape, but Morely has done it with this idea that’s deceptively simple – deceptive because if it were really as simple as it seems, someone else would have done it first. He’s created an app that’s allows audience members to send messages to the screens on stage, and then what happens is in our hands.
Can a crowd really be trusted with that type of power? What will people do if they’re in the safety of anonymity within a group and can choose to mess up a show or not? What if you could have crowd work where the performer doesn’t control the direction of every interaction, but the people sitting down get to initiate?
Morely doesn’t count on the audience to make the show work – that would be a recipe for something that might be great on a few nights and a disaster on most of them. He’s written a lot of strong material on the subject of audience/performer dynamics, performance conventions, and societal-level human ethics. It is, I promise, funnier than it sounds. Morely has struck a perfect balance between audience bits that allow for spontaneity and a different experience every night; and a performer-led structure that is solid and makes sure it’ll be good every night.
Morely’s mild-mannered style really sells the concept – he commits fully to the character, to convincing us to get on board with the experiment. This is one of the most creative things I’ve seen in Edinburgh, and it’s a great time.