Handsome, Accessible Puns: Midsomer Mergers, the 2015 Law Revue

I love puns. Puns are great. Revues should embrace puns as openly as Law Revue does, because there’s something satisfying about hearing a room of 500 people groan all at once about a subtraction song with the lead in “Take It Away”.

And that’s perhaps what Law Revue does best: short, sharp gags that don’t take up too much time and require quick blackouts to let the audience know that yes, this girl feeling herself up with a football onstage is playing touch footy, it’s laughter time now. I saw Law Revue’s opening night, and unfortunately the punch to some of those short-sharp sketches was bogged down by frantic tech mishaps, which the cast, to their credit, managed very well. The cast, incidentally, were all pretty great, but unfortunately I know none of their names – so apologies, Law Revue cast, that I won’t give shout-outs to anyone except the directors, but please know that I’m making finger-guns at you all with a mouth clicky noise.

The standouts in Law Revue were its musical numbers, aided in no small part by a sick band. The singing was impressive – director Lachlan Cameron sang his absolute heart out in a Bee Gees parody about Anxiety, some stunning ladies sang a Fever/FIFA parody, and Chris Pyne and a student belted it out Les Mis style. The second half saw Bronwyn Bishop singing Rihanna (BBHMM is my current jam so A+ work there), an adequate climate change song to Bad Blood, and a song about morning after brunch which fucking killed it.

The sketch-writing this year was very accessible. Law Revue knows its audience is the law crowd rather than the comedy crowd, so while I was bummed about a lack of most absurdist or comically risky sketches, I recognise that I am not their average viewer. Memorable moments involved a date of two people from LinkedIn, some great physicality from director Tash Gillezeau in a Fitbit sketch, and a kinky horse whose love of being whipped outstripped their moral fibre. The AV sketches went on a bit, but the Killing Season parody of sexist, cootie-fearing politicians played exclusively by female cast-members was a smart choice, and it paid off.

There were a lot of sketches in Law Revue which I wanted to see fleshed out properly. Their habit of ending sketches at the first joke means they miss a lot of moments that could be pulled out of an idea. I wanted to see more of the Greek Gods fixing the economic crisis – was Zeus gonna fuck their way out of it? I wanted more from Mario’s “It’s not you, it’s a-me” breakup. Why did the bad Michael Caine impressionist meander around with ~rAnDoM~ humour for a bit instead of making silly references to Michael Caine movies? Law Revue’s eagerness to cut straight to the punchline can sometimes mean they miss out on the real juicy follow up laughs, and for such a talented cast that’s a real shame.

They ended the show on a damn high note though, with an anthem about gay rights as told by clueless, self-righteous straight allies (amen). The cool jam of “Ice Ice Baby” fitted beautifully into “Gay Rights Right Baby”, and the dancing was sharp. I couldn’t tell how the audience was receiving the sketch because I was laughing/agreeing too loudly.

But above all else, Law Revue this year begs the question: why is their cast so very very attractive and who amongst them wants my number?