A grabby title and a clear concept sell tickets at the Edinburgh fringe. Australian comedy duo James Schloeffel and Charles Firth have gone the extra mile by giving their show its own logo, a middle finger that raises flamelike on a screen in their workplace presentation. The pair play consultants, here to navigate us through – and often just swear incessantly about – the hellscape of office politics, meaningless business jargon and interminable meetings, which this hour regrettably begins to resemble.
Fittingly, the first part is about standing out from the crowd. Having swiftly sacked (or “de-hired”) a bloke in the front row, they present a guide to exaggerating work experiences for his CV. Ever had a bar job? That means you’ve “managed a portfolio of liquid assets”. In the first of several games with the audience, we then guess the job from the highfalutin description. It’s initially amusing, then over-extended, with flatly unfunny bits on Jesus and Hitler’s LinkedIn profiles. Later, a passive-aggressive email is offered up as the cause of the war in Ukraine and there are similarly flippant references to the Post Office scandal, none done with any nuance.
