Edinburgh Fringe comedy review

Dadaism has a true inheritor in the form of David Correos, probably the best Taskmaster contestant ever, now thankfully finding his audience in the UK after first trying out the festival many years ago and being roundly ignored. 

Hungry reviewers looking for themes or even guiding comedic principles to talk about are likely to be frustrated, as Correos just throws anything he feels like up on stage in what seems like a totally random order: food, costumes, stand-up routines, songs, his own videos, other people’s videos, anything is of use if he thinks it might be funny.

Screaming, full of beans and still setting up his props well into the show, he’s dressed at the outset like Where’s Wally?, although he apologises that he ‘lost the shirt.’ 

His first bit is a video of a virtual rollercoaster, and he wants us all to stand up and do the motions, but the screen becomes impossible to see as soon as the front row get to their feet. He’s hastily scrambled into a priest costume which he wears on top of his Where’s Wally? costume. Neither of them is really relevant to the show. Chaos reigns.

With no point to anything and nothing to really build to, the show lives and dies on the strength of its bits, and on Correos’ charmingly anarchic personality. His instincts, luckily, are rock solid. 

Maybe it’s just his style that makes it work when he unveils a Kinder Surprise hidden in the pit of an avocado, or sings the plot of Genesis to the tune of Sweet Home Alabama, but he’s so enthusiastic and hellbent on experimenting that the audience gets swept along in the flow.

Correos’ pitfalls as a performer are 1) when he reflexively comments on the accessibility of his own material too much and 2) when he falls into the common clowning trap of getting 2a) naked and 2b) messy for no reason, both of which happened in his recent UK tour, and both of which he smartly avoids here. 

A David Correos audience is not concerned with whether his work has commercial viability or not; we’re here to taste the genius of concepts like ‘Fat Spider-Man who’s also not that smart, but he has a gun,’ or to watch him dressed as a lobster and trying to eat an Aero mousse with two litter pickers. This glorious Shambles needs no justification.

Review date: 22 Aug 2026
Reviewed by: Tim Harding
Reviewed at: Monkey Barrel Comedy at O'Neill's (The Tron)