Comedy, in many respects, is an intuitive art form. Comedians thrive on audience interaction and if you’re unlucky enough to be sat within roasting distance of a decent comedian at a show then you’re in for a long night.
Newly adopted Brighton local and up-and-coming comedy talent, Dan Jones, played a sold-out show at Komedia on Saturday night (18th November 2023) and was fortunate enough to ease himself into his set by focusing on the attire of a group of unsuspecting lads in the front row. This proved to be a handy segue into the thematic thrust of his new set, ‘This Seems Ambitious,’ which focused on all things love and loss for a man leaving his relative youth behind him.
Jones’s set blended bad taste with philosophical humour to intoxicating effect and he came out of the traps flying with his quick wit and, thanks to some help in the front row, nuanced appreciation for the doomed plight of young love. Jones, like many of his deadpan contemporaries, is self-deprecating enough to bring a rare amount of empathy and existential dread to his performances and, as such, can make a routine technical failure, such as a projector malfunction, seem like a bit.
Jones allows his audience to squirm and cringe with him as he delights in mocking himself and others with equal dosages of perfectly timed comic bravado. Where his comedy thrives is in making the mundane seem sacred with “low energy” anecdotes designed to bore his audience into laughing. But ‘This Seems Ambitious’ is far from mundane, it’s rather profound and touching, and by the end of the set, you’ll be struggling to hold back the tears in more ways than one.
Overall score: 4 out of 5
Looking for something to do in Brighton? Check out what’s on at Komedia: https://www.komedia.co.uk/brighton/
