Larry Dean is the workhorse of Saturday Night Live UK: the Glaswegian comic didn’t necessarily get the kudos of the show’s breakout stars like George Fouracres or Jack Shep, or his younger fellow stand-ups Ania Magliano and Paddy Young. But in season one he performed in more sketches than anybody else, and if you didn’t notice then that’s because he’s a chameleonic presence, his astonishing command of accents making him an invaluable supporting player.
It’s also somewhat unfair to invoke SNL when he’s been a big deal in Scotland in particular for over a decade: certainly he’s playing the biggest room at the Fringe this year of anyone from the show.
A set of old school observational raconteurism
And it’s a very pleasant hour of comedy, albeit one that feels summed up by Dean’s late confession that he gave the show the title Hellbent because he was expecting there to be more fractiousness around his recent wedding to his now husband than was in fact the case. The large contingent of Catholics and small delegation of Iranians at the wedding had a lovely time, apparently. Instead the show is framed around his relationship with his autistic, Black County-accented husband - from meeting to marriage - and is essentially a set of old school observational raconteurism.
It’s all very agreeable, elevated by Dean’s gift for accents. He never quite makes it his main thing, but he’s incredibly deft with it: his bit on the two types of Americans had me snorting. Ultimately, though, he’s just… a bit normie? Accurate as his observations are, there’s an impenetrable slickness to him that means it’s hard to really feel you know him any better after an hour of talking about himself than you did at the beginning. Also he does a really hackneyed bit about how crap Birmingham is that was always going to wind up any Brummies in the audience (ie me).
He doesn”t come across as intriguingly weird as his many co-workers dotted about the festival this year. But there’s a reason why he’s the one playing the biggest room.
