Slam Frank tickets

Absolutely bonkers experience that will leave you delighted and very unsettled.

See this show if you enjoy satire, want something weird and provocative, like shows within shows, and appreciate edgy humour that takes aim at woke culture. Don't see this show if you're easily offended by stereotypes targeting different communities, prefer a more cohesive or clever book, are uncomfortable with material that can come across as antisemitic, dislike edgelord humour, or are sensitive to revisionist portrayals of real-life historical figures. Saw this show 10/12 matinee. It is ~1hr 40 min with no intermission Slam Frank was a lot funnier than I expected and considerably less offensive than people had led me to believe. There was really only one scene that made me pause, and it wasn't the “Hitler is trans” section. The first half was considerably funnier than the second, which eventually veered into what felt like an antisemitic hate fest. Yes, I understand the creator is Jewish, but that doesn't automatically make every joke work. There is a difference between drawing parallels between 1930s/1940s Germany and present-day Israel and making every Jewish person the target of the joke. Eventually, it felt like the show was punching down just to be edgy. I enjoyed songs like “Yeast of Edith” and “Non-Binary”. I also appreciated the opening land acknowledgement and the jokes about people who use multiple neurodivergent labels to seem unique, as well as those who may be pretending for clout. My biggest issue is that the show tries to tackle too many things instead of sticking to its central premise of making fun of woke culture. The book needs a rework, and the show could easily lose about 20 minutes. The Adolf/Adelina subplot felt like it was aiming for a “Springtime for Hitler” moment from The Producers, but with considerably less cleverness. Ironically, I'd love to see John Anker Bow as Roger De Bris in The Producers. The cast was good across the board and did their best with the material. However, the musical's Hamilton-heavy pastiches occasionally bordered on outright copying. I'm still undecided about whether the show needs an intermission, especially given how dramatically the second half shifts gears. Then again, a 20-minute trim might solve that problem. Real review score would be 6.5/10

Wasn’t my cup of tea. Wanted to enjoy it more.