The Classic
Review: David Lawrence
Some might have been offended when Michael Barrymore observed in his Auckland show last month that if you kick a Japanese hard enough in the backside you get a nip in the air. But not the two Japanese guys in this act, who began by thanking the United States for the bomb.
They've got every nippy, slant-eyed, karate-chopping, no-speak-Ingrish cliche in the tourist phrasebook.
In a series of comic/straightman routines and minimalist sketches using a handful of props, the duo ridiculed themselves, their country and anything Asian with a vehemence that indicated a severe case of cultural self-loathing.
The bowing tourist as a woodpecker ... sushi taken to extremes of freshness ... kung fu cooking (messy in the front row). All very manic with lots of high-pitched exclamatory squealing.
But the material was not quite as unconventional as the novel delivery made it seem, and certainly not as outrageous as some might have been hoping for. No horrifying mutilation or amazing feats of endurance in the physical comedy, I'm afraid, just simple slapstick.
A commentary on Japan being the technological centre of the world led us to the talking toilet - cue basic scatological humour. A copy of Prayboy magazine was produced - cue basic masturbation gags.
Even ancient and venerable Western jokes put in the occasional appearance. "I like women. My mother's a woman."
Mostly they came over like schoolboys trying to shock.
A smallish audience was fitfully amused on Monday night - perhaps not as amused as the performers had expected, which may explain why they kept instructing people to laugh.
Kamikaze? Well, they didn't die but injuries were sustained.
The show, part of the International Laugh! Festival, runs until Saturday.