It was ashes to ashes, funk to the downright funky at Ross Noble’s Jibber Jabber Jamboree show. The tousle-haired comic leapt onto the stage – and across all the fake jungle vines – and was welcomed by an applauding audience itching to see the reigning champion of surrealist improv.
Should you need to keep track of Noble’s stream of consciousness, it’d be wise to bring a map. Or, sit back and let the comedian's undulating Geordie accent whisk you on a journey with enough diversions to leave a halo of twittering birds orbiting your head. In signature fashion, Noble somehow managed to squeeze all sorts in his show, from Mother Theresa, the Australian Grand Prix (his sound effects deserve a show in themselves) and Barack Obama doing mime to monkeypox, shoeing a horse and having sex to the Ghostbusters theme.
I saw Noble on the Adelaide leg of his tour, and he was hysterically funny, bouncing off the audience’s energy like the Duracell bunny. This time around, something didn’t quite bite. Perhaps this was our fault. As is always the case with Noble’s spontaneous stand-up, the heckling and conversations with his audience are a big part of the routine. Fresh off being at the Grand Prix, Noble pressed some theatregoers about their experience, but they gave him crumbs to work with while the rest of us drifted off into the distance. “Don’t lose me!” Noble implored the audience as he tried to zap juice out of what may as well have been a banana.
Fortuitously, the comedian struck luck when an audience member called Shania piped up to say she had brought her mother with her – in a cremation box. It transpired that one of her last dying wishes was to sit at the front row and “heckle” Noble. Absolutely gazumped, Noble took the remains onto the stage. “This is the weirdest double act ever,” he jested. After teasing that he would scatter the ashes on stage to do a snow angel, ripples of laughter reverberated around the theatre. Saved by the box.
It wouldn’t be a Ross Noble show if there weren’t moments that caused you to bite your lip. That’s part of his provocative schtick. From gender politics to terrorists, you can’t help but sit upright at moments and wonder if, as Noble even asks himself, tonight is the show where he “gets cancelled.” But while he may tread close to the line, he somehow always somersaults back to safety.
More of a jibber jabber than a jamboree, the show is still well worth seeing for an insight into a wizardly mind where tangential thoughts run amuck. What’s more, only a comedy squirrel like him could somehow spin nuts, seeds and fruit out of someone’s grief. Noble stuff indeed.
Running until April 23, book tickets to see Jibber Jabber Jamboree on the MICF website here.
