Mustafa Algiyadi @ Just the Tonic

Mustafa Algiyadi’s Almost Legal Alien struggles to take-off during a show riddled with complications. Only seven people are in attendance, and a street-wide power cut has the comedian speaking at his audience from the stage without a mic, as if in some kind of hastily arranged careers workshop that feels, quite frankly, tense.

Some introductory crowd work, a preamble to the show proper and introduced as such, marks one of many explicitly stated segues; prompts that stand to disjoint the flow of the set even further. To Algiyadi’s credit, the show is delivered in full despite the Herculean task ahead. It’s difficult to ascertain if the set’s familiar beats – marrying for a more powerful passport, the travails of airport security racism, the inability to get a mortgage as a gigging comedian – would fare better under more usual stand-up conditions, but a tepid response does little to assuage a plainly awkward dynamic. While there may not be a need to reinvent the wheel every time, prosaic punch lines land inconsistently.

Topper gags central to the set’s framework (Algiyadi’s personal characteristics which make Algiyadi a prime candidate for marriage) are well-placed, but aren’t quite tight enough to be a laugh-a-minute. Similarly, a bit satirising meditation apps is funny in isolation, and continues a flirtation with a slightly bluer brand of comedy, but it feels jarring and awkward here.  

Overall, Algiyadi’s nature is confident and inviting but the material proves too light and unvarying to carry the show through the onerous situation that he finds himself up against. Above all, Algiyadi is pertinacious and committed and that is applaudable; the situation just proved too large a hill to crest.

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Mustafa Algiyadi: Almost Legal Alien, Just the Tonic Nucleus (Sub-Atomic Room), until 25 Aug (not 12), 4.30pm, £5-10