Come Again, Mr Berman

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 31987, 14 May 1969, Page 18

Come Again, Mr Berman

“New Sides of Shelley Berman.” Solo comic routines by American entertainer, Shelley Berman. Theatre Royal. One night only.

Like all great comedians, Shelley Berman takes life seriously. Life, he suggests, is a string of personal problems we share with every other person. Sharing them ip the theatre with Mr Berman as a sometimes-sadistic,

somatimes-sympathetic chorus is a kind of catharsis through laughter. Certainly the bursts of delighted laughter last evening must have been largely recognition of the fact that our secret fears and worries, frustrations and inconveniences are really public property. He chatted naturally about his difficulty in having a family; he dramatlsed the tortuous ramblings of a mind mfing to persuade itself to rive up and go to sleep; he lectured amiably on our attitude to that special chamber

known, according to one’s degree of refinement and sensibility, as the toilet, the bathroom, the 100, the . . . : and he analysed international misunderstandings in terms of a language barrier which results in a riotous failure in even elementary communication.

There were not really any new sides to Shelley Berman, but there were so many sides that each pese came as a minor revelation. First, he ehatted the audience informally, man to man—or more pointedly, man to woman. Then came a familiar set piece: the man telephoning to explain that there was a woman hanging on to a window ledge, about to fall. After this, a three-man sketch for one player. Next, his relaxed lecturer style. And so on through passionate oratory to mumble-and-sbuffle, intimate confessions which turned out to be an encore obligingly included in the show—just in case we did not ask for it. He was able to be tough on

America without seeming unpatriotic, barbed about New Zealand without appearing unappreciative, and cruel to Australia without any chance of loosing his audience’s sympathy. His ability to spend much of his time either in or around either the bed or the lavatory without lowering one whit his wit was a tribute to his talent, his judgment and his Originality. 'This remarkable personality, quite magnetic to the eye and the ear, was strangely prepared for by two local groups. Christine Smith has an attractive voice and sang some arrestingly imaginative folk songs, but she is miles away from the urbanity of Shelley Berman’s world. And Brendan Duggan, for all his rich tones, has neither the personality nor the material to introduce an entertainment which invites the mind and the heart to wake up and take, a good long look at itself. Make sure there's a next time, Mr Berman.—P.R.S.