Review: Chuckle Busters: Fin Taylor, Wardrobe

Chuckle Busters is pulling in some great national acts since it moved to its new(ish) space at the Wardrobe Theatre in Old Market, and it’s no secret why they’re stopping here: the intimate, warm space and raked seating gives every act a chance to shine, and the audience is discerning yet friendly. It’s a great setting for the regular mixed-bill, club-style nights (classier and less raucous than average), as well as the odd single-act, Edinburgh-style show, such as the one Fin Taylor brings tonight.

Taylor’s show Whitey McWhiteface was a talking point at this year’s Edinburgh Fringe, and it’s not hard to see why. His subject is white privilege, that invisible force that he and most of his audience benefit from, silently and often unknowingly. It’s a restless, self-reflective, inconsistent performance, as uncomfortable and confusing as it is funny and thought-provoking.

After warming up with a few well-aimed observations on the language we use for white and black people (white people “potter”, black people “loiter”), Taylor moves on to the darker side of middle-class tweeness and hipsterism. He describes the waxed-moustachioed artist types in East London, moving their penny farthings into homes recently vacated by priced-out British Asians (“if you’re going to displace an old Indian guy from his home, don’t do it while dressed as a Victorian”).

Not content that he’s pushed our buttons hard enough, Taylor moves on to the less palatable beliefs of intellectual left-wingers like himself, which see him sharing some views with the extreme right in that they want to “kill all Jews”, whereas he only wants to “kill about ten” (the political and military high command in Israel).

“Spicy” stuff, as Taylor acknowledges, but he’s a white man who’s already told us that he’s left-wing, and so “can get away with anything.” This is a key line in a show that, crucially, never lets Taylor off the hook any more than his audience. He’s “a bit of a dick”, who revels in the artistic licence that his race and privilege give him; the fact that he acknowledges this shouldn’t make it any less obscene.

Which is where the confusion kicks in, because there’s a fair amount of seemingly unexamined prejudice sloshing around in the mix too: particularly in Taylor’s treatment of older women, who are not once but twice used as the targets of some visceral, violent imagery in which Taylor’s revulsion is so apparent that the oldest, female member of the audience walks out.

Speaking as a fellow white man, I couldn’t quite let this go and the show left an interesting, yet slightly sour taste in my mouth. To second-guess Taylor’s take on this, perhaps I secretly resent being presented with the darker side of my own cultural advantage; or perhaps I’m an over-sensitive member of the ‘New Left’, who having lost all the major battles now spends too much time worrying about such trifles as ageism, fatphobia and gluten intolerance.

I suspect it’s actually because Taylor can’t maintain the very high standards of intelligence and self-reflectiveness that he sets at the best moments of this show. Nevertheless, it does that rare thing: getting a (mostly) white, liberal comedy audience to seriously question their ideas, and often laugh themselves silly in the process.

Fin Taylor played the Wardrobe Theatre on Friday, Oct  21 as part of the weekly Chuckle Busters comedy nights. For upcoming Chuckle Busters lineups, visit www.thewardrobetheatre.com/livetheatre/chuckle-busters