Gein's Family Giftshop reportedly swept all before them at this year's London Sketchfest, and now make their first Edinburgh appearance. It's an impressive one: this is a fluid, dark sketch show that's usually a step ahead of its audience. Featuring copious masturbation, dead grans and bestiality, it can get a bit remorseless. But its three stars are very watchable: authoritarian James Meehan, diffident, downbeat Kath Hughes and first-among-equals Ed Easton, whose lo-camp, faintly hysterical energy gives the show its off-kilter charge.
There's nothing meaningful about the Manchester trio's material: they signal their commitment to silliness with a fine intro dance, all goofy jerks and synchronised middle fingers raised at the audience. On paper, it's juvenile stuff: "just jizz and bumholes", as Hughes identifies. Sometimes, that's wearing: the sketch in which Meehan shits in his friends' coffee has little to offer; another, about a woman scared of flying, revels in vindictiveness and not much else. The self-reflexive backchat doesn't always come off: it's good to focus on Hughes's status as the bullied woman, but it'd be better still not to bully her.
More often, the material transcends GFG's merciless tendencies, as when Easton plays a monkey that Hughes has been interfering with. (The bestiality gag soon graduates to a joke about whether the ape can talk.) None of this is given context, props or scene-setting. We often laugh because something strange is happening, then laugh again when the premise is retroactively revealed. It helps that the trio's timing is terrific, and the script densely packed with laugh lines. The highlights give space to Easton's suppressed neurosis, as when he summons the "scary Mary" ghost from a mirror, which devolves into a flirtation; or when he plays a boundaries-free barfly whose chat-up shtick resembles sexual assault. The mix of sick humour and stoopid antics is characteristic – it's a strong debut.
Until 24 August. Box office: 0131 556 6550. Venue: Pleasance Courtyard.
