Our verdict: three stars
After grappling with the pronunciation for some time, it transpires that the d in Djalili is silent. Want to know what's also silent at Omid Djalili's set at the King's Theatre, part of the Glasgow Comedy Festival? This writer.
The name of Djalili's tour - Iranalamadingdong - should have acted as a sign, if not a warning, of what the night would hold. For the most part, his performance is saturated by jokes that if he were not Iranian-British, would be racist, but because he is Iranian, can't be - at least, that is his logic.
But the glaring issue is that there really isn't much of a set to judge. After twenty minutes there is an interval of half an hour, then the second half - better in content, and more cohesive - is just forty-five minutes long including a bizarre encore where the comic performs a parody of the U2 song Ordinary Love. It is a parody though, right? Difficult to say, what with Djalili's awkward singing which isn't bad enough to be funny and instead feels like a man on a stage living out an unrealised childhood dream.
This the Omid Djalili show, let us make no mistake. He references - twice - the three Hollywood films he's acted in (you'll need to Google it if you're unsure - this guy needs no extra free PR). Similarly, there are parts where he veers off, albeit briefly, into self-indulgent monologues that appear to be more in-jokes than actual jokes. Clue: the audience isn't in on them.
There are well-perceived segments, with sharp observations about the inherent unwritten rules of every family and a nice line about using the retrospective James Bonds as a litmus test for age. More of the same would have been good, which would have been entirely possible if not for that yawning interval.
For the brevity of the set, Djalili jovially blames Jerry Sadowitz who is also playing at the venue later that night starting at 9pm. Unless Sadowitz is sitting behind the stage encouraging Djalili to take that monolithic break in the middle however, there's no one to blame but Djalili himself.
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 hereComments are closed on this article