Brighton Fringe Review: KIDS CAN HECKLE!, Laughing Horse @ The Walrus (Raised Room)

“I’m trying to work out the unit economics of a tooth”

Kids Can Heckle!, hosted by comedian Ollie Horn, has an interesting concept. As you might be able to guess from the title, children are allowed to heckle. In fact, according to the show’s descriptions, they are “encouraged to jump in, share their ideas, and be as silly as possible,” so you can definitely expect some voices to be chiming in along with Horn’s!

At the beginning of the show, Horn poses a question to the audience - what defines a kid? There are a range of answers from the children, including adults having to pay bills while kids “poo bills” and adults having more hair, quickly disproven by Horn when he points out several bald men in the audience. After some intense debate, the prize for the best heckle is revealed. The kid with the best heckle will receive a t-shirt. The best adult heckle? A trip to Turkey, as, according to one of the children, adults go bald. We start off quite strong, with one of the children raising their hands and politely asking, “When is the show gonna start?”  There is then a long debate over what to do in case a lion enters the room and attacks.

The show turns into what Horn calls the “Brighton Junior Fringe Open Mic” as one of the children is brough onstage, doing a few knock knock jokes in order to prove that he’s funnier than Horn. The kid tells a few nonsensical jokes, to which Horn responds with, “A lesson for us all there,” getting laughs from the adults in the room. There are quite a few bits for the adults throughout the show in order to keep them entertained, including how, in a previous show, Horn had “Talked about meeting a bear . . . Not in a Brighton way.”

After a singalong to “The Penguin Song” with one of the children calling everyone in the audience to attention as dancing penguins, Horn ends the show with a Mad Libs-like story, asking the children for words and then inviting a children and adult on stage to play out the story written by the audience. It’s a fun moment that works really well with the enthusiastic participants and it is lovely to see children getting so enthused about standup comedy!

Ultimately, Kids Can Heckle! is a fantastic show for children to get into the world of comedy while still being allowed to be kids and interact with the performance. It’s great to see how enthusiastic they are and Horn is able to handle any interjection with ease, making everyone in the room feel welcome (with some great quips for the adults as well).

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