Werner Weber’s Devolution, The Theory of Stupid.

I have spoken about Werner before, I have mentioned his show, hell, I have even had an interview with him. What I have not done is talked properly about his show. Well that wasn’t really possible until last week Wednesday when I hopped (like a rabbit?) to On Broadway, took my seat in the second row (weirdly called A. This first row is AA and the third row is B. Theatre logic escapes me) and waited for the musician to end his opening gig.

 The show opened with a video clip starring Werner himself and Angel Blythe as the ‘Dumb Chick’. Werner plays the narrator of a documentary trying to do the intro but the dumb chick keeps interrupting rudely in her quest for the ladies (also the loo). Angel disappears off screen and then comes on stage and interacts with the Werner on the screen. This serves as an interesting way to introduce continuity to the show before Werner disappears off screen and is introduced and we are ready to go.

 

Werner starts by talking about his personal travels through life and his observations about the human race. How we treat activities like buying condoms when we are younger compared to how we handle it as we get older. As well as how our bodies change over time, as do our medical checkups. Werner has a “pull no punches” approach to comedy which I find very enjoyable. Although I’m sure not everyone wants to hear about proctology exams and lesbians who make their own tampons out of Rizla papers and string. Regardless, the first half of the show was met with laughter from everyone in the crowd. I was brought to tears a number of times. Werner was on fire. Then he decided to call for an interval, rather abruptly.

 When the second half began it felt like he had lost some of his fire and the crowd was a bit quieter. It seemed like he was struggling a bit to recover, but he did as soon as he started speaking about his three dogs with their distinct personalities. From there Werner had his fire back and the show was saved. Devolution is a new show and still needs some work. It felt like it could have been shorter and the way the interval was announced was a bit too hasty. The opening bit was brilliant though and very well timed. It will be interesting to see this show again after this initial run to see what Werner, a fairly new comic, has adjusted and improved. When Devolution has another run, I will be there to see it indeed to see the improvements.