★★★★
There’s something inspired about doing two-person stand-up. Rohan Ashar and Mani Ahmed have this great double-act energy, and a machine-gun approach to gags. From the outset I was completely on board, as they explained how their Indian and Pakistani heritage meant they should be enemies, but with a neutral zone between them they’d be able to work peacefully together (the Kashmir gag sent me!)
Beyond their repartee, Rohan and Mani each showcase their own stand up. With Rohan he talks about being autistic, race and that feeling of otherness many of us have. He’s direct with his deconstruction of structural racism in the UK, and the way race is categorised. As he points out, the majority of the audience are white, and there’s a sense that the obvious jokes about curry are for us.
Where Rohan is deadpan and direct, Mani is personable and twinkly. His flavour of stand-up has more lightness of touch and he finds the laughs with clever asides, so many, the audience end up missing them.
At the show’s climax, Rohan and Mani come together again to deliver a quiz, with questions to test the audience’s otherness. This is the hour’s core message, that otherness is the rule not the exception, and that we need embrace and understand one another, and respectfully see each other for who we are.
Other is on at The Alcove at Laughing Horse @ Bar 50 until August 18th
