Nick White: Teenage Dream
Nick White is not in the building. Well, he clearly is, but he’s currently pretending to be his alter ego, Carli Furplam, aka the dullest co-worker. She’s warming up for him and is super-keen, only she has put exactly one hour on the meter, is parked half an hour away because driving in the city is too stressful, and so she’s on a tight deadline to get the show going and get gone. Her nervous stream of hair-tugging consciousness, replete with robotic “What’s your name and occupation?” crowd work, makes for a gently gigglish entry to this sophomore show from the architect-turned-TikTok star who racks up hundreds of thousands of views on each of his posts. She’ll be back, later on, in an aside that may or may not be a bit, because the relaxed and reliably likeable, handsomely moustachioed White makes a virtue of appearing as if everything is off the cuff. And that’s not easy to do, especially if you’re prone to social anxiety, a situation that White has harnessed to great effect in his delightfully silly show. Rolling along amiably, much of his deftly delivered asides are aided by a well-judged eyebrow raise or a spot of imagined banter with the family pup. Teenage Dreams is a fun insight into his foundational years and the bridge into so-called adulthood, having recently settled in Melbourne. There’s a fun bit about the cutest form of (accidental) self-harm imaginable, via a Malcolm in the Middle dream gone wrong that only gets more hilarious when his mum suggests an inexpl