Review – Amos Gill: Extrovertigo

At what point do you declare potential bias in these sorts of things? How closely do you have to know someone for your opinion to be sullied by the connection? If you’ve met them once, I think most people would agree you could still be impartial in your critique. Film critics interview stars and directors, after all, and no one is accusing Margaret & David of being in the pocket of Big Scorsese.

So once is fine, then. What about a few times? A handshake here and there, in shared circles. A raised eyebrow of acknowledgment across a room. That’s not enough to impugn my reputation, surely? (The uniformly anonymous “heckler” author tag above notwithstanding.) How about sharing a beer in their vicinity at a mutual friend’s party, twice? It’s not like you have any stakes in the matter, right? No skin off my back if he’s reviewed well or poorly.

What if, in one or two unplanned encounters, you drink together into the night, talking deeply and passionately about common interests and a shared love of comedy? What if you accidentally brush his arm and he looks deeply into your eyes and for a moment you wonder if there’s room in your world for this, a new unfamiliar and yet not unwelcome feeling, a rush of blood to the head and the giddiness of connection, of human connection, of two spiralling arms of interconnected galaxies colliding for just one brief moment in the dizzying randomness of life – two bright spots whizzing past each other in the inexorable march of time immemorial?

Or whatever. You could get away with it, I think.

Amos Gill is the Fringe’s standout performer. His blisteringly funny set at the Rhino Room reveals a young comic that will make you feel inadequate after matching your life trajectory to his accomplishments. Endowed with a natural sense of both story-telling and comedic timing, Gill’s new material dives into the tension between his natural outgoing streak and anxious paranoia, in an hour that demonstrates more thematic cohesion and sense of wholeness than that of veterans twenty years his senior. Relaxed and confident on stage, he’s adept enough to both seize an opportunity for riffing with audience members while also knowing when to save them from an unexpected question.

Keep an eye on this one – he’s going places. It’s a pity I kind of know the guy; it would have been nice not to worry about making sure the review held up objectively. Luckily, if you’re to judge by the laughs Gill was getting last night, it wasn’t just me.