This is Sachin Kumarendran's debut hour of comedy, and there is a lot of promise in his work. The show is predominantly about the outlandish lies he’s told over the years, including his height while dating, and his ownership of a mansion for a video submission to the reboot of Channel 4’s Shipwrecked.
But beyond the lies, this show also touches on fleshlights, chodes, chemical burns, how awful Middlesbrough is… And mass shootings. Y’know, standard comedy stuff!
Sachin repeatedly (and unnecessarily) asserted that everything he said was true, which was an interesting dichotomy given the show was called Deceit. It is as though he felt the need to reassure the audience that he is different from other comedians – not over-embellishing his stories for comedic effect.
Perhaps this came from a desire to avoid the stereotypical show, which he said would have seen him, as an Asian, hosting a show called ‘The Asian Cultural Thinktank Hour', where he speaks only to his race, and how the whole family love mango molasses. He pondered whether he’d get a higher star rating from the high brow reviewers (hello!) who are nearly all white (oh, never mind) and who wouldn’t dare give a lower rating to a minority ethnic because of latent white guilt. Although funny, that in itself almost threatened to give way to stereotypical content – aren’t social constructs a minefield?!
One thing I feel required to mention is that I would disagree with the reviewer he called out for criticising his PowerPoint element as weak – I would personally say it was the stronger material in his set, and certainly more focused. This section is where he showed us the video submissions for his Channel 4 casting, which were personal highlights.
On the whole though, Deceit feels like a show still in need of some previews and refinement. I would say there was enough solid material for around 40 minutes, and the rest felt a bit like filler. Nonetheless the material that is polished is of a high calibre, and I'm certain Sachin will be one to watch out for, so get in early if you want to brag that you saw a star ‘before he was big’.
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