Emma Wilkinson

The creators of SPLEEN must have done everything in their power to lower the public’s expectations of their new sketch show. The set design consists of pieces of A4 paper with funny faces half-heartedly blu-tacked around the theatre, and the self-deprecating promotional flier I picked up the day before contained several quotes from critics in ‘praise’ of the actors: “left me a little disappointed”; “looks uncomfortable in his own skin”. Fooled by these pretences, it was with some surprise that I found SPLEEN to be an excellent piece of comedy.

Throughout the night, the cast delivered material that was creative and original, rarely retreating into the tropes and clichés of the sketch show genre. A running joke in which Tom Fraser repeatedly broke the fourth wall to share his increasingly paranoid and hilarious suspicions gave the show a sense of coherence

The sketches were strong across the board. Fraser, wearing a bonnet, played the role of an oversized toddler to perfection. The cast handled dark topics such as suicide masterfully in a darkly humorous performance of one-upmanship, and there was even a touch of satire in the form of a misogynistic rapper, intended as a comment on the questionable lyrics of present-day rappers like Eminem.

It seems that the cast of SPLEEN might be more skilled at writing great comedy than acting it. While the acting was generally competent, with spot-on comic timing and seamless character changing, there were times when the performers began to over-act. Even taking into account the histrionic nature of a comedy sketch show, the dramatics of some sketches, such as a particularly flustered University Challenge voiceover and a hysterical conspiracy theorist, were over-the-top in a way that occasionally subtracted from their comedic potential. 

It was no coincidence that the majority of the top sketches of the night featured Ellen Robertson. Her jittering antics, playing a nervous actor whose internal monologue was broadcast from backstage, earned her the biggest laughs of the night. Where Robertson really shone was when she acted as a sounding board for her fellow performers, bouncing back lines and setting up jokes even when she herself wasn’t delivering the punch lines.

Central to the success of SPLEEN was the genuine feeling of camaraderie between the performers, which the audience seemed to pick up on. The atmosphere in the Corpus Playroom was comfortable and encouraging, with everyone clearly rooting for the show’s success. Sketch shows are a dime a dozen in Cambridge, but SPLEEN, with its ingeniously original script, is a must-see.