Stand 4

5-16th August

22:40

£8

Did you have a bad auntie when you were a kid? You’ll know one if you had one. A bad auntie is loud and funny, and by no means necessarily an actual relative. She’ll bring you sweets and give you cash from her purse, she’ll buy you clothes you love, and that your mum won’t let you wear outside of the house afterwards. She’s a bit flashy, a bit sexy, a bit gaudy, a bit much. She has an edge: she drinks a lot of gin…  it could go either way by the end of the night. There will be singing at some point: you can rely on that.  If your childhood held such an exciting figure you’ll recognise Ms Bellini immediately. She is the archetypical bad auntie, in all her majesty and tragedy. Watch her belting Tom Jones songs out in a gawdy frock, making lewd gestures with vegetables and flirting outrageously with other people’s husbands.  She’s a fascinating glittery car crash: the woman ten pints in at the local karaoke, dressed more for her Eurovision debut than another Friday night down The Hoppy. Jo-Jo Bellini: liberating shameless, unreservedly passionate and properly silly. There are some great songs and gags here, but neither her voice nor her jokes the real strength or charm of the show. Bellini brings the private, closed-door kitchen-sink diva that lurks within all of us out under the spotlight, inviting us all to be just as wantonly daft as she is. You will sing-along, and love it, you will be fed, you may win an elephant. There is a genuine sense of audience camaraderie by the end, and the crowd leave on a perceivable high. This would be a perfect end to a fringe night out with pals, a very cute show to take a date –it’s a bit saucy, and I don’t just mean the food- and is even the sort of thing you could go see with your mum in the safe knowledge that no-one’s about to say anything ‘too political.”

It would be a miserable soul indeed who wasn’t a wee bit cheered by This and That: A Late Night Tasty Delight. Well worth a visit. FOUR STARS

Reviewer : Katie Craig