Josie Long @ The Stand

Josie Long's new show is underpinned by some great ideas about personal and political uncertainty but doesn't always get into its stride

Review by Ben Venables | 09 Mar 2017

A set-design of traditional trade union banners suggest an old school socialism with which Josie Long happily identifies. While the message woven into the fabric might read 'Adele is a Genius!', the effect of this backdrop is for Long to question if she's become a little out of time. That's out of time in the obvious sense, of being unable to change now past political results, but also Long wonders if she's out of time in another sense. Does she understand the most recent political fashions? She's not alone in finding it difficult to comprehend nefarious online activity influencing elections.

It's such vulnerability which guides Something Better into intriguing territory. For taking a political position, Long has often found herself caricatured as naive. It's a patronising view and Long is not one to Pangloss over anything. In fact, she's finding it difficult to be the optimistic one at the moment. It's hard to be the one people rally to in a crisis. As the political sands shift beneath her, crisis mode gives way to feelings of anger and desolation.

Of course, it's not all politics for a comedian with her range. During an impromptu pre-show karaoke she gives a husky rendition of Rupert Holmes' Pina Colada song, her line-by-line analysis reminding us she can make tangential nonsense hilarious. In the show proper, there's a joyous routine misquoting To Kill A Mockingbird. The gag stretches to breaking point – but in Long's hands it's funnier for it.

She does stray from the focus of the show a few too many times though. A couple of anecdotes about her first jobs work as individual segments but act as caprices which interrupt her flow. At these times, it becomes easy to forget Something Better is set in the weeks following Brexit, or how she came to be on a train misjudging a man's politics when there's a gap in the story. That's not to say Long needs to stick to a narrative show; it's just she doesn't always follow the premise she initially sets up.

An ending quoting from Hope in the Dark by Rebecca Solnit refreshes our sense of Long's political commitment in uncertain times. It leaves an impression of the most powerful and intriguing parts of Something Better – where Long astutely explores the darkness as much as she attempts to find hope.


Josie Long: Something Better, The Stand Comedy Club, Glasgow, 9 & 11 Mar, 7:30pm, £12/£10.