Edinburgh Fringe comedy review

John Achkar’s whole deal is pretty much laid bare in his verbose show title: ‘His country is collapsing. He’s having a baby. So obviously, this is the right year for a Lebanese comedian you’ve never heard of to try English stand-up for the first time.’

But maybe the most salient point that’s been left out is that he isn’t some chancer trying to get a foothold in the UK scene, he’s an internationally renowned comedian in Arabic-speaking countries who’s been on multiple world tours and has well over a million followers on various platforms. The day of this show marked only his 13th ever day performing in English. His last gig in Arabic was performed to 3,000 people.

All of which makes it curious that he’s chosen to stop in at the Fringe, performing in a dank corridor to 50 people, many of them bilingual Arabic fans because, as he jokes, ‘it’s so much cheaper to see me in English.’

Achkar has heard from reliable sources that ‘the story is more important than the jokes’ at the Fringe, but he’s a mainstream comedian through-and-through, and this is no art show, even though he has a biography that most Fringe comics would kill for, including his experiences in war-torn Lebanon, at least one divorce, and going viral in Dubai. 

As he recounts an anecdote about how comfortable he became with bombs going off around him, it’s hard not to think about how well-adjusted he seems compared to the legions of North London comedians he’s surrounded by.

Most likely, he has his own private crosses to bear, but he wisely steers clear of too much experimentation with tone, instead leaning into his strengths as a loveable, bearish comic storyteller, able to find the common comedic ground between Western and Arabic culture. 

Understandably, there’s a level of sophistication that he’s yet to access in English, which is especially apparent in his groany puns, but it’s almost a pleasure to look past that for someone who's been doing English stand-up for less than two weeks.

Review date: 27 Aug 2026
Reviewed by: Tim Harding
Reviewed at: Just The Tonic at The Caves