George Zach: Greek Tragedy

George Zach is a Greek comedian who took this work in progress show, Greek Tragedy, to the 2015 Edinburgh Fringe. The title is vaguely misleading because the show is your fairly bog-standard blend of semi-autobiographical anecdotes and witty social observation rather than any sort of comedy re-telling of classic Greek texts.

Zach himself is charming and obviously comfortable behind a microphone.

Zach himself is charming and obviously comfortable behind a microphone. He talks about growing up in Greece and living in London. The dichotomy between these two cultures forms the basis for all the anecdotes in his show. Self-deprecating and warm he never challenges his audience too much staying in fairly safe compare and contrast territory all evening. Riffing off everything from his own accent to his posh English girlfriend’s tennis court, his traditional Greek dad’s homophobia and his childhood experiences of being forced to play the accordion he builds a relaxed rapport with his audience by quickly identifying and chatting to any Greek punters.

For all his chilled chattiness however Zach’s set is a bit on the bland side precisely because he doesn’t take enough risks. He offers an interesting insight into modern Greek culture even giving us his own profound take on the economic crisis ‘we’ve fucked it all up’ but all too often resorts to a cheeky swear word to make a punch line. His musical gags all stem from the 90s so that jokes about S Club 7’s Reach, Oasis’s Wonderwall and Robbie William’s Angels make him seem a bit out of date.

Zach is a likeable enough comic but lacks the confidence needed to push himself and his audience out of the tried and tested social observation comfort zone.