Kit & The Widow: All That Twitters - Fringe 2009
Live Review

What a jolly little romp through the world of cabaret and camp kitsch, surrounded by tweed, twin sets and the elite of the Radio 4 listenership. Kit Hesketh-Harvey and The Widow (Richard Sisson) are polite society’s acceptable face of camp musical comedy, far removed from the risque capers of the Four Poofs and a word away from the leather posing pouches of Topping and Butch.

This is old-school campery at its very finest featuring incredibly tame and clever innuendo,  giggles about amusing place names – who would want to live in Bell End? – and even a mirror ball thrown in for good measure.  

That’s not to say that there is no substance, there are some beautifully intelligent lyrics set to the gorgeous piano accompaniment by Sisson.  The tribute to Barack Obama is particularly funny and very well-written. Nor is it all political or current, we are also treated to a spectacular rendition of Abba’s Fernando, rewritten in honour of a well known chicken restaurant.

Despite the tame approach this upper-middle class audience may have still yet have a fair bit to learn about liberalism with the most astonishing audience walk-out I have ever seen.  During the cheekily titled but entirely harmless 27 Reasons To Be Gay, five members of the crowd stormed out.  

This highlights the difference in the K&W market and the rest of the Fringe audiences, not a single expletive was uttered, not a single taboo tackled but yet the subject matter alone was enough to incite some sunny afternoon homophobia.

The majority of the audience return year in, year out to enjoy the sedate stylings of this amiable duo and the walk outs are dismissed with a wave of the hand and a rude aside that has the Kit & Widow faithfuls rolling in the aisles.

Kit and The Widow will never be the act to make you question the big issues of the day nor do they claim to want to. If you want some lighthearted, inoffensive and affable comedy then you are not going to get much better than this.