Tom Allen – The Gilded Balloon, Edinburgh Review

Let’s be honest, Tom Allen does not come across as a particularly tough man.
Dressed in skin-tight pink jeans, a perfectly ironed white shirt and a perfectly placed turquoise scarf he probably strikes the audience as more of a Jack McFarland than a Jack Bauer. He is not the type of man who goes out looking for a fight (as he puts it, he would rather just lie on the ground voluntarily than go through the formality of being ‘knocked’ to it) and he is not the type of man who would generally cause a scene after his drug-dealing neighbour let his dog treat his doorstep like a toilet.

It’s tales like these that make Tom Allen Toughens Up such a genuinely comical examination of how nice, polite people manage to get by in the world (or don’t, for that matter!). Although he is openly gay, his sexuality does not in any way dominate his material which makes for a fairly refreshing change. He instead opts to tell clever, witty stories about life experiences that everyone can relate to which make for a side-splitting hours worth of entertainment. Highlights include his account of what happened when he offered to help a disabled man carry his bag and his recollection of his first kiss.

Even his voice and mannerisms are enough to provoke a slight chuckle from the crowd – a trait that is very reminiscent of a certain award-winning, chart-topping comedian that goes by the name of Michael Mc Intyre. And if Tom Allen Toughens Up is anything to go by, he may just be about to follow McIntyre’s steps on the road to comedy super-stardom!

Read our interview with Tom here.

By Amy Anderson