Blake Everett: deb(u)t | Adelaide Fringe 2022 review

Everett’s ridiculously topsy-turvy, surreal performance has plenty of hilarious moments, but it’s in need of some tightening.

Adelaide Fringe 2022. Blake Everett: deb(u)t. Picture: Adelaide Fringe

Blake Everett: deb(u)t

The Bally at Gluttony until March 6

Rating: ***1/2

Nonsense is Blake Everett’s game, and it’s a game he knows how to play well. But when absurdity falls into disarray, it begins to feel unpolished, erring on clumsy.

Bringing what he’s dubbed a “flashback of a flashback of a retrospective flash forward” to the late-night stage, Everett’s performance has its hilarious, if bizarre, moments, but it’s in need of some tightening and could definitely do with a little less reliance on dick jokes.

The strengths are when silliness prevails. Everett’s wackiness shines through the musical numbers peppered throughout the set, and towards the end as the show purposely unravels. Not to mention his “dad joke” bit that had the audience in stitches.

But a few grotty oral sex and masturbation gags lost me early on, and it was hard to come back from that.

There’s still plenty of good stuff here for a late night offering, and there’s potential for it to strengthen as the week goes on. Perhaps this is one for the three-beer-plus crowd.