Bounding on to the stage like a man unleashed, Mullan has an immediate kinetic rapport with the crowd. He jumps in with both feet, twitching and doing Scottish seagull impersonations, conjuring and delivering scenarios and stories at a mile a minute. He has an eye for the craic, diving into his metaphorical wardrobe of personal history tales and coming out hard. There’s almost too much material and too many styles of delivery but there’s a lot of good stuff.
Mullan is always engaging, though frequently too relentless, a gale of ideas and tangents, swirling in a dervish of possibilities.
There’s a gift for conjuring worlds from Mullan that is great fun to behold, combining a range of accents and physical commitment to communication that pays off. And a few real comedic gems are here, demonstrating an eye for gag writing which hits home when he gets the timing right. At some points in the show the punchlines are weaker than the set-ups, or the stories strong but not structured as well as the sections that fully land but there is real writing skill here, albeit combined but with some impatience in development.
‘Rascal’ serves up a vivid slice of Mullan’s childhood – an unusual mix of Argentinian and Irish parentage, along with eccentric school days, finding therapy, and then a philosophical exploration of love. His likeability is strong throughout, whether the laughs are loud or in waiting. It feels perversely both personal and frothy, a reflection perhaps that Mullan is still wrestling with emotional honesty as well as comedic styles.
Stephen Mullan: Rascal, Assembly George Square – The Box, until August 25
https://tickets.edfringe.com/whats-on#q=%22Stephen%20Mullan%3A%20Rascal%22
