Triple-threat doesn’t begin to describe the abilities of Larry Owens, a writer, singer, comedian, Broadway star and more besides. The Baltimore man originated the main role of Usher in hit musical A Strange Loop and appeared in the TV comedies Abbott Elementary and Search Party, all while honing his musical-comedy craft on the same New York cabaret circuit as recent Edinburgh favourite Cat Cohen. His skills are as blazing as Cohen’s, even if this fringe debut is not the finished article.
It’s arguably more showcase than show, with Owens hurling at us song after song – now angel-voiced, now raising the rafters. This stuff is engineered for whoops and cheers, a response which, if not forthcoming, Owens will openly insist upon. His opening number heralds his uncategorisable individuality: he’s “too white for black people, too poor for rich people”, and – take a deep breath – “too self-actualised to be recognised by the marginalised identities white men made to define me”. Later tracks hymn his transactional relationship with his therapist, or find him pastiching Billie Eilish and Lil Nas X in comic songs about, respectively, the opioid epidemic and having a homophobic mum.
It’s all framed by the backstory of Owens’ early career, which sees him delivering audition tapes on demand when a major US comedy show comes calling. Would this song in character as Oprah Winfrey do? How’s about this impersonation of never knowingly undramatic movie star Viola Davis?
It’s engaging stuff, even if the references might lose some of their potency on this side of the Atlantic. There’s potency in spades, mind you, when Owens starts singing about Eric Garner and “I can’t breathe”, as his show explores the relationship between his creativity and his struggle as a queer black man, and what he stands to lose were success (and money, and acceptance) to come his way.
That strand of thinking might be better threaded throughout the show, and is in any case swiftly dispatched in a set that lasts a mere 45 minutes – before that rarest of things, an Edinburgh fringe encore. (Sondheim’s Being Alive, if you’re asking.) But if the show is underdeveloped, Owens’ presence and talent are irresistible.
• At Assembly Roxy, Edinburgh, until 27 August
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