Wednesday 3 April 2024

Microsoft Orifice review (Melbourne International Comedy Festival)

The daily grind of the office job. It's not easy. In Microsoft Orifice, John Glover stares down the barrel of a staple gun as he vents and gripes about the current state of the workplace and technology, namely social media. 

Glover has a warm presence and he has a great gift of the gab. Armed with a clicker and a PowerPoint slide show, he is confident with his material and because of that, he can throw to audience members for a brief chit chat or acknowledge something that has been said by an audience member, even when he gets the order of his slides confused, which he handles brilliantly.

There's a lot of material on attractiveness and physical appearances: why are flight attendants so hot, why is Glover's personal trainer so hot, and a number of comments about not looking - but looking - at Glover's arms as he completes his set in a sleeveless t-shirt. It's not that there's anything wrong with that, but it's also not very exciting or imaginative.

Glover's use of visual aids has highs and lows, but seeing his list of Pokemon characters and the log of his myriad of daily msn status updates across years (which if you don't want your audience to be able to read, then maybe don't present it), don't lead to anything substantial.

Glover tells us at one point he's a gay man who lives in Sydney and works in marketing. How common and familiar he jokes. Sadly, Microsoft Orifice is also a common and familiar 50 minutes of stand-up that covers stereotypical gay commentary about urban life.

SHOW DETAILS

Venue: The Catfish Bar, 30-32 Gertrude St, Fitzroy
Season:
 until 6 April | 5:30pm
Duration:
 50 minutes
Tickets:
 $26
Bookings:
 Melbourne International Comedy Festival

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