Shamwagon

Published on Thursday 12 January 2006 01:28

****

THE STAND, EDINBURGH

WATCHING the members of this super-slick new improv troupe riffing off each other like a gaggle of particularly quick-witted mindreaders, you could have been forgiven for thinking they'd worked together before. And you'd have been right. Jamie Anderson, Humphrey Ker, David Reed, Thom Tuck and Idil Sukan have all performed with the well-established Edinburgh University improv outfit, the Improverts, where such luminaries as Kevin McKidd (Trainspotting) and Miles Jupp (Balamory) cut their teeth.

Their Stand debut on Tuesday night was split into three sections. In the first, the audience were invited to write suggestions for sketches on their tickets and place them in a hat on the stage. The Shammers then proceeded to act some of them out.

Inevitably they struggled once or twice, but they were savvy enough to roll with the punches, generating plenty of laughs at their own expense when things started to go wrong. More often than not, though, things went right, and when they did they went very right indeed.

Confronted with a suggestion that simply read "toaster fun", Sukan and Ker quickly snapped into character as a couple of toaster obsessives, willing to skip work in order to spend quality time with their favourite appliance. By the time Anderson had burst into the scene with "Guys! Guys! Do I hear an element heating slowly?" the audience were rolling in the aisles.

There followed an improvised comedy playlet, given the title When the Cowboy Went Ape by the audience, and a final, quickfire section in which a word from one scene provided the basis for the next. If the pace started to slow a little towards the end, it was only because Anderson and co had given their all, and then some. This gig was supposed to be a one-off, but Stand head honcho Tommy Sheppard says he's thinking of making it a regular event. Not a bad idea.