Stephen Lynch: The 3 Balloons Tour. The Palms at Crown, Melbourne.
Diminutive YouTube phenonemon and Tony Award Nominee Stephen Lynch took all of about a minute to have the capacity crowd eating out of his hands with a hilarious video about a ‘Hands on a Hard Body’ competition. In it, Mr Lynch has been in training for ages (along with a rag-tag bunch of other competitors), to endure the wintery elements and keep his hands firmly planted on a truck. The person who keeps their hands on the truck the longest, wins the truck. Hands gloved and incredibly psyched up for what could be any number of days and nights ahead, the competition begins and everyone places their hands on the truck. Lynch’s punch-drunk enthusiasm immediately gets the better of him, and in a moment of unbridled glee, he removes his hands from the truck and waves them about in the air. And he is immediately disqualified.
It is this marvelously endearing moment of self-deprecating humour that sets the tone for all that is follow, as Lynch sets out to avenge his obvious failings with the incarnation of a (literally) devilishly sexy and blokey personae where nothing is off-limits. His imitation of Christopher Reeve (“Dear Diary”) was spectacular – just as his safety valve (the words “too soon?”) challenged us all to lighten up and question the extent to which we were truly outraged. The difference is all in the intention, and one never sensed that Mr Lynch was being cruel. He was, instead, harvesting recognisable moments of our lives and our history to bring us all to the euphoric point of just being able to have a bloody good laugh, in spite of our earnest concerns about being politically incorrect.
This was certainly not a show for the uptight PC crowd who would have been totally offended by much of what was on offer. When comedians push the envelope to the extent that Mr Lynch does, it all comes down to talent and charisma. Even though he admitted to feeling terribly jetlagged and sick (which showed in some of the slower rambling segments that barely held together), you never had the sense that here was a performer taking themselves too seriously.
There was also the added bonus of the devoted audience singing along (not bad for someone whose work we only know of from YouTube), and his song about his “special” friend (“Special Ed”) had the audience roaring out the lyrics (“ … and now his mother keeps him in the / SHED!”) Interestingly, the most vocal members of the audience were male – proving that regardless how we all feel about a song about waiting for the results of our AIDS test (which started the show), its provocative lyrics certainly found their mark. Subliminally, Mr Lynch is also making a significant comment about the importance of safe-sex – and I would posit that a large percentage of his audience would take-home a punchy and compelling message about the need for it in their lives. He should be congratulated for taking the time and the responsibility because, frankly, no-one else is.
Lynch was superbly supported by his best mate Rod Cone who, expertly, was the butt (both literally and figuratively) of Mr Lynch’s rambling odyssey to bromance and appalling humourous, blokey camaraderie. Their song about the ‘hot girl’s fat best friend’ in the pub was so spot-on that it has been the subject of much conversation ever since – as was the song about “Queer Tattoos”, which was almost as clever and tear-inducingly hilarious as it got.
The sound at The Palms at Crown was stunning, but the lighting was appalling which resulted in a nasty shadow residing under Mr Lynch’s chin all night which only succeeded in ageing him by about thirty years. Utterly unattractive.
Knife-edge satire (where Mr Lynch happily and unapologetically lives) is a punishing form of comedy, and lesser talents would have crumbled under the conceit. Not so Mr Lynch, whose singing voice, diction and timing is fantastic and who can really belt out his tunes on the guitar and the piano. His use of his guitar as a lute was just sensational. Tom Lehrer, Noel Coward, Peter Cook and Dudley Moore all forged careers with satirical observations about the cause and effect of manners, ambition, society and the travails that come with each and all of those things – and Mr Lynch is doing a marvellous job of keeping the camp fires burning. Check him out on YouTube. You may very well be mortified, but you won’t be disappointed.
This review was commissioned by Stage Whispers Magazine @ www.stagewhispers.com.au
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