Rob Auton’s schoolboy philosopher takes a few moments to warm to, but his show-and-tell of all things sky-related quickly goes from bewildering to dazzling.
Once immersed in his borderline autistic world there are all sorts of bizarre pearls of wisdom to behold.
Unfazed by the sparse crowd of just 14 in the tiny room at Upstairs At Three And Ten, Auton used the intimacy to launch a meandering conversation about which character Tom Hanks might play if he had been in Top Gun.
The York-born stand-up’s deliberately amateurish presentation used bedroom-made newspaper The Sky, a patchwork of Pritt-Sticked cut-outs from The Sun, as his comedic scripture. From here he delivered a series of fantastical sermons and surreal vignettes that relied as much on awkward gaps as dialogue.
A self-styled “public speaker”, Auton prefers rambling poems and made-up Jesus anecdotes to conventional jokes, despite winning best joke of the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.
And while his concept show is not loaded with belly laughs, Auton’s warmth and innocence as he enthused about the sky’s magnificence was totally compelling, climaxing in a poignant meditation on the power of the imagination.
- Rob Auton returns to Upstairs At Three And Ten on Saturday, October 26. Call 07800 983290
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