This commentary will likely offend people and I unapologetically say that is not my problem. What I am concerned about is the fact that theatre shows in this country are not what they used to be and a case in point is the Mori J’ Von Comedy Jam.

The idea behind the show is to produce and sustain a comedy series on local television, but it is also being passed off as a theatre production. When someone can patch a production together without considering whether some of the basic elements are there and offer it up for public consumption theatre shows are in trouble.

I am no expert and am hardly qualified to say what defines a good production, but I know a poor show when I see one and the Mori J’ Von Comedy Jam on Friday, February 19, 2010 fit neatly into the category of shows that have been staged at the National Cultural Centre (NCC) and were simply not ready. It was a disaster, to put it mildly, and someone has got to say to the people behind it that it is wrong to sell the public something which was still in its embryonic stage.

I believe in the power of ideas because it is what drives us and the creators of Mori J’Von had an idea, but it turned out to be just that—an idea. It was not a show and hardly a production.

I sat there and watched as the show crawled from skit to skit and as it made the jump it left in its wake one wreckage after another and there is only so much that I can tolerate given my fragile nerves.

The show was struggling to make it through the first half and I could no longer endure the pile-up of poor material on offer. I took a few breaths and stormed out of the auditorium of the NCC to calm down and decide whether it was worth going back in. What had I seen up to this point? Opening skits about obeah fraud and how blindly people believe in it and also the urgent need for copyright laws, which were bearable. There was also a sloppy and unnecessary skit glorifying ganja and then a disastrous parody of the Link Show; this was by far the most unfortunate skit because of how terrible it was.

The show also featured a sexed-up dance that bordered on vulgarity with a young woman throwing up her skirt in the face of her male dance partner; at one point his head was under her skirt. Patrons, as they are wont to do, laughed and continued laughing, but it was downright offensive as was the skit involving an elderly woman who had problems with her pension. The woman ended up stripping off her clothes, not in the nude thankfully, but her underwear did end up on a man’s head. Altogether, they were in poor taste.

Not surprisingly, there were other patrons out in the foyer of the NCC fuming over what they too had seen, which was practically nothing. One of the employees of the NCC bluntly said to us that the producers had sold an advertisement to lure us there, but had nothing to offer us. I agreed with the woman; she was absolutely right.

“Don’t buss a vessel girl, just go home,” a man said to me and I took a few more breaths and decided that home was the better option. There was no way I was going back into the cultural centre to sit and cringe through that train wreck.

What was worse, the show was promoting an obnoxious local comedian who called himself “Chubby”. This guy is the reason some people despise local comedians and would rather listen to bad karaoke than hear them spew filth.

His comedy was wrapped up in lame sexual jokes and he tried anything for a laugh; picking on people in the audience and repeating internet circulated jokes. When he struggled to get a laugh he got offensive and this turned out to be the most regrettable part of the show.

I gave up my Friday night to go the NCC expecting a nice evening and left with a sour taste in my mouth. There were so many other things that were wrong with the show; the insufferably late start, some obviously amateur actors, its weak script and poor direction.

What is even more sad is that scores of people who showed up at the NCC were entertained as against the few who left mid-way like me; a sign that a culture of vulgarity now permeates society. The irony is that the best part of the show was the opening when Tennecia De Freitas, the junior calypso queen performed her piece, “Mama, I Don’t Want to be Born”. I say no more. (thescene@stabroeknews.com)