LIVERPOOL THEATRE FESTIVAL, BOMBED OUT CHURCH, LIVERPOOL – 11TH SEPTEMBER 2022
REVIEWED BY MIA BOWEN
4****
After returning for a third consecutive year, the Liverpool Theatre Festival ended with a big splash last night! Written and performed by Paulus, The Cabaret Geek and featuring Michael Roulston as the musical director, Looking For Me Friend is a charming, funny and touching tribute to the late great Victoria Wood. The audience sat in the pouring rain, all wearing ponchos (one of Wood’s favourite words), very British, just like a Wood sketch, reminiscing the Queen of Comedy.
Currently celebrating 30 years in entertainment, Paulus is best known as the sharp and forthright judge on BBC One’s talent show, All Together Now. He admitted that Wood’s skills in observational comedy and satirising aspects of social class, was an early influence on his own career. Much of Wood’s humour was grounded in everyday life and included references to activities, attitudes and products that are considered to exemplify Britain. It was in fact a ‘one liner’ from Wood that introduced Paulus and Roulston, and together they would quote snatches of classic lines from Victoria Wood: As Seen On TV, comedy series. Paulus also recalled how when he was struggling for work as a young actor, he wrote to several celebrities for help and advice and Wood send him £50, which he spend on Christmas decorations!
This show was so much more then a tribute show; it was kind, pleasant and very funny. Through Paulus’s interpretation of Wood’s songs; It Would Never Have Worked, Reincarnation and The Ballad of Barry and Freda (Let’s Do It), blended with autobiography and theatrical entertainment, we are reminded that Victoria Wood was indeed a National Treasure.
Paulus and Roulston together on stage prove that it takes two men to do the work of one woman!