NOTE: This review will contain mild, marked spoilers.
I don’t know what to believe anymore.
In a sea of zany, chaotic shows, Zach Mandeville brings Storytellers, a seemingly simple hour of stand-up to the New Zealand Fringe Festival. Framed as an exercise in anecdotes and narrative, it promises to be a tell-all of the stories behind his favourite jokes.
That’s exactly what it is. Until it isn’t.
The loop of Zach’s performance is a sturdy one. He opens each segment with a joke that normally doesn’t quite land the way a comedian would like their jokes to, mostly due to the fact that it requires the context of living in a certain place, at a certain time, under certain socio-economic factors. But Zach’s wiser than that. He weaponises the confusion amongst the crowd to get stuck into how he came about the joke, by detailing the circumstances under which he wrote it then, once all the context is laid out, retells the joke to rapturous applause. Then the cycle begins anew, with each new story leading on from the last.
It takes a very special kind of performer to pull that off. You have to build the tension carefully, while delivering nuggets of payoff throughout to avoid the audience’s boredom settling in. You have to make sure that, once all is said and done, the conclusion of the story was worth the time it took to tell it. The narrative has to earn its keep. Mandeville nails it every single goddamn time.
SPOILERS
He’s just so good at maintaining the illusion of groundedness. The stories are initially a little wacky and strange, but relatable and charming. They lure you into a sense of comfort, like a guide bringing you down a garden path. You admire the flowers, blissfully unaware of the twists in store. Suddenly, a chord of doubt is struck. Something Mandeville says doesn’t quite line up. You start thinking. Isn’t what he just said a little… too far-fetched? Surely, he shouldn’t be disclosing that at a comedy show? Those can’t possibly be real band names, can they? The turn hits at different points for different people, but it hits hard. One by one, the audience catches on to Mandeville’s sly trick. He lays out all the clues for you, you just didn’t want to look at them. You wanted to believe. The scattering of epiphany throughout the room is an absolute blast, and Mandeville revels in its execution. You never know when the truth stopped, and lies began. He’s just that good.
SPOILERS END
His storytelling ability is a superpower. The narrative he weaves is so clean that you’re always certain you know where he’s going with the story. Sometimes you’re right, sometimes you’re wrong, but you’re always feeling like you’re in good hands. There are moments when you feel like you’ve got him dead to rights, that you know what the story is leading to, then he hits you with an absolute belter that leaves you equally laughing, crying, coping and seething. His stories are so carefully crafted that you’re always surprised, but never lost.
Despite the nature of the stories, Mandeville comes across as one of the most authentic performers in the city. That’s how he holds onto his cards for so long, and why they hit so hard when he plays them. His confidence on stage is entirely earned, and the crowd hangs onto his every word. So much so that it’s only once the show concludes that we realise he’s gone twenty minutes over his scheduled ending. He makes a liar of time.
That’s crazy.
Disclosure: As a somewhat active member of the Wellington performing arts community, I may be quite familiar with a number of the performers in this show. Having said that, I am not a liar, and there is zero bias in my reviews, shut up.
Also, tickets were provided to me for free by the production. Literally changes nothing, though