It’s an endeavour that sounds so ludicrous, so against-the-odds, that you can’t help wonder if Mark Thomas knew he was going to make a show about it at some point. It was after a trip to Palestine in 2010 that, a few years later, the comedian/firebrand decided to start a comedy club in the occupied territory. After charming his way through Israeli customs, he promptly travelled into the West Bank, headed to the Jenin Freedom Theatre, rounded up a group of wannabe Palestinian comics, and founded a comedy workshop. And, yep, hilarity ensues.
Joe Douglas’s production is a curious but thoroughly entertaining mix of stand-up and fond recollection, delivered by Thomas alongside former protégés Faisal Abu Alhayjaa and Alaa Shehada. Thomas tells of his culture-shock experiences with impassioned gusto, recalling how he’d be startled awake in the morning by the muezzin’s call, and of being coerced into drinking saltwater on live Arabic TV in a kind of Middle Eastern equivalent of the ice bucket challenge. If you have any qualms about his white-saviour role, he pre-empts them with a few self-deprecating gags. In any case, I strongly doubt Thomas would care when I say the true highlight in ‘Showtime From the Frontline’ is when Alhayjaa and Shehada perform the sets they originally did in front of the JFC's stern officials.
If some of the gags don’t resonate with British audiences, it doesn’t matter. In their pithy observations – the politics of Palestinian weddings; Israeli-enforced curfew becoming an excuse for copious amounts of nookie – we’re reminded that the refugees of the West Bank aren’t just hapless victims but also, well, people. They have the same foibles and quirks as anybody else. (It’s a terrific shame that only these two guys could come over to perform; projected footage attests to two brilliant female comics).
The serious message here is that to seek out the funnybone of an oppressed people is one of the profoundest forms of dissidence going. Authoritarians, as a rule, don’t like laughter. As Thomas points out, Donald Trump’s tweets get very angry indeed after each airing of ‘Saturday Night Live’.