Edinburgh Fringe comedy review

You can say what you want about Dylan Adler as long as you think he’s a star. As a high-octane theatre kid with an extravagantly camp queerness, he throws all the razzmatazz he can into entertaining the people, even in a Fringe shipping container.

He’s dressed in a silk kimono – a nod to his twin heritage of being both half-Japanese and a divine diva of the stage. This whole show – indeed his whole damn career - is a defiant response to the high-school bully who targeted him for being gay, even in the ultra-liberal San Francisco Bay Area.

Showing off is his response to everything. To impress his parents the young Adler wrote a musical about football – sample lyric: ‘I kick the ball in the hole’.  When someone suggests he looks like an ancient Japanese emperor, he writes a musical about it; when he wants to discuss portrayals of Asian sexuality… you guessed it.

We are rarely more than three sentences from a sound sting or full-on song. And I mean full-on, as he’s a big performer with a big voice, as well as being a talented, classically trained pianist who attacks his keyboard with fervour.

The show is steeped in pop culture, too. If you don’t know your ‘bye, Felicia’ meme, for example, you’re missing out. And with his performative, larger-than-life, lascivious persona, Adler – who merrily reclaims many LGBT slurs – is not shattering any gay stereotypes. 

Yet behind all the flamboyance lies some fascinating stories and opinions. His grandfather signed up to be a kamikazi pilot, for instance, a mind-blowing fact that would be some performers’ entire show.

He toured coal mining towns of America’s Deep South and found them more progressive than he thought,, he reflects on his family – both the Japanese and Jewish sides  – and directly discusses the portrayal of Asian men in gay porn: why are they always shown as the ‘bottom’, asks this proud top.

Whether wrapping anything sincere in a sparkly, jaunty song is the best way get the message across is moot (and the cunnilingus mime he does to celebrate a punchline definitely outstays its limited welcome)  but showmanship is in Adler’s blood and he won’t be stopped. You even get a backflip, people, what more do you want from him? Just revel in that star quality.&

Review date: 3 Aug 2025
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
Reviewed at: Pleasance Courtyard