Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2013 REVIEW – Andrew Lawrence – There Is No Escape ***.5

Andrew Lawrence – There Is No Escape, Pleasance Courtyard 8:50pm, until 25 Aug, £13.50 (£12 concessions)

After a tedious twenty minute delay due to a technical hitch with the previous performance at the Pleasance One, Andrew Lawrence shuffled cautiously onto the stage to greet his first audience of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2013.

Despite not being a household name, you may well have seen him on the BBC’s Michael McIntyre’s Comedy Roadshow and Live at the Apollo, where the self-deprecating comedian has been known to ridicule his appearance and demeanour, in good spirits.

The comedian confirmed early on in the show that he had no sympathy for people who did not like his material, commenting that in this age of technology it is easy to watch at least some portions of comedian’s sets online before deciding on what to see live – it’s not his fault, particularly if you are ‘lazy’ and don’t do your ‘research’!

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMaivHvJ030?rel=0]

He also remarked that there are billions of people in the world, and that it didn’t matter too much if anyone returned or not as there would be other, new people in the crowd at the following show. Staying with this thought, he smiled with a hint of sadness that, despite there being billions of people on Earth, there were still some empty seats in the auditorium.

Lawrence, a usually confident performer who controls his anecdotes with superior word choice and tone, displayed such traits throughout the show, but perhaps with a bit more caution than was expected. The momentum was dashed at times, although he reacted well to the one or two audience departures, and his interaction with the members of the audience sitting in the front row  was well executed.

Going to ‘There Is No Escape’ could be compared to running into the sea – you initially think it might not be the best thing to do, but once you are in it’s fine, although Lawrence seemed slightly ‘out at sea’ himself at times. This may be due to first-night nerves, the fact that it was a preview show or a slight lack of confidence in developing the direction of his latest material.

Essentially, a substantial amount of his punchlines, which were reached via crafty, comedic timing, caused laugh-out-loud moments and the 46 minutes that he was on stage were enjoyable.

After commenting on the heavy rain on the roof, and suggesting the show had possibly been bad as a result of being able to hear it, Lawrence’s eyes confirmed that he could have done better, and he certainly can, as proven on several TV appearances and in ten years of comedy performances.

Perhaps he feels there is ‘no escape’ from comedy, and hopefully he won’t escape from it just yet. This show earns 3 and a half stars for the content of the performance combined with the audience interaction, with his confidence sure to increase over the duration of the festival.