Joe Hart: Dirty Rotten Apples
Gilded Balloon until August 31
Two stars
Self-confessed ‘gay nerd’ Joe Hart is obviously a likeable chap but that likeability is the only thing that gets the audience to the end of this debut Fringe show. He’s devised a decent concept to bind his material together – the history of the world according to apples, which takes us from the Garden of Eden, through Ancient Greece, the Crusades, Isaac Newton and Rene Magritte to the Apple Watch – but his punchlines don’t add any snap, crackle or pop to the clever stuff. His routines are so packed with information that you wish he’d slow down a little and give us time to absorb what he’s saying. And when a joke hits the ground with the force of gravity, he’s too quick to apologise or explain, which hints that he too recognises that this show isn’t yet strong enough to stand up to the scrutiny of Edinburgh in August. What little laughs there are come when he veers off track and dips into his own personal history.
Alan Morrison
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here