Late Night Gimp Fight!
Live Review

Comedy snobs, there is nothing for you to see here. But fans of toilet humour, stupidity and gratuitous nudity – this is all for you.

With a title like this and a late time slot, there is little chance that people will stumble across this show expecting anything other than the hour of puerile, sexual and base humour they provide. But my God they do it well.

This is high-energy, homoerotic, deviant nonsense which is performed superbly by the Gimpish quintet. And they are completely unapologetic about their joy in all things taboo and immature with incredibly cheap and nasty jokes about paedophilia, gratuitous violence and nudity making regular appearances. But they are charming with it and the in-your-face, joyous delivery makes it impossible to resist.

Try as you might the gimps – simply known as Lee Gimp, Matt Gimp, David Gimp, Richard Gimp and Paul Gimp – will wear you down and make you laugh at the most ridiculous things. They are catering perfectly for a late night crowd that would be drawn to their name, so when they do try something more high brow it is completely lost on the audience. Even a very simple and obvious skit about Waiting For Godot flies over the head of the beered up audience who are expecting bums not Beckett.

The videos shown to cover transitions between scenes retain the Gimps' ethos of shock and puerility, with old adverts and song videos being edited over with the word Gimp. It could be clever branding but it is really just another successful attempt to get an easy laugh.

This is unlike any sketch show I've seen before. Some of the content is reminiscent of student revue groups out to shock mummy and daddy but the production, direction and delivery is as flawless as some of the most respected sketch groups on the Fringe. The Gimps clearly love what they do and there is a great chemistry between the five of them. Some of them could invest a little in singing lessons if they are going to have musical numbers but they are a joy to watch.

I defy anyone not to let out a chuckle at these five lads, but I would suggest that with full frontal nudity and a whole lot of gimp masks it is not the show for the easily offended.