South Wales Evening Post 29th October 2008

Ashley Smith, who writes and performs a one-man show called Comfortism, appeared three years ago in the fringe at the Brunswick pub.

This time, after giving a performance workshop to Swansea Metropolitan University students of performance and literature, he provided somewhat different fare — a disturbing mixture of comedy, absurdity, social, political and historical comment.

In a 60-minute non-stop show that had a large degree of audience participation, he demonstrated why live performance can be so necessary. You never felt comfortable, and you felt all the better for it.

Buxton Fringe

A surreal mixture of mini plays, scenes, and monologues written and performed by Ashley Lloyd Smith. This is performance poetry taken a step further into edgy interactive theatre. With charm and some subtlety our wordsmith takes his audience on a varied journey around his, and perhaps our own, perceptions.

One or two of the darker pieces like Blood Road need the lighter company of Four Kinds of Parenting which is a classic in the making, and Some Addictions . . . was worth the entry price on its own. A writer with talent that could rise to starry heights if he can find his niche in the world of Tea Vea.

Jean Ball


Theatre Wales

Aberystwyth Arts Centre April 18, 2008 do the right thing… but not right now by Comfortism

The Open Platform Programme at Aberystwyth Arts Centre is a very important part of AAC’s arts development, attracting a diverse array of upcoming semi-pro and professional performers and performance groups which can showcase their work in a supportive environment with minimal financial outlay, venue-wise. The latest in this season’s works came from writer, solo performer, Aber drama grad and Derby-based maths teacher Ashley Lloyd Smith, trading as Comfortism, with his show ‘do the right thing… just not right now’.

Having been one of those very entertainingly targeted by Comfortism’s guerrilla ad campaign on Facebook, I was unsure what to expect, but amused by the possibilities. Having been told on arrival at the Arts Centre with the words ‘audience participation’ linked to the content of the show, I was less convinced that I would have an enjoyable experience, but, by and large, I must say I was wrong.

A series of nineteen individual and individually titled segments (a twentieth, ‘No one ever bombs Scotland’ has been removed owing to events in the last year or so) are delivered by the very engaging Lloyd Smith in an informal style, ranging from low comedy to highly political, personal pieces, and often invoking mild levels of audience involvement.

When any show starts on a pretty lavatorial tone with references to an old man farting in the face of our host for the evening, I was, I must admit, a tad disheartened, especially when it progressed to a more outré, almost apocalyptic, gun-toting monologue entitled ‘Lastminute.com’ and a gigglesome but fairly faux-shocking discussion of an encounter with musician Richard Hawley in Toronto, but we went on in a more quirky vein with subverted comic discussions of parenting and the perils of warts, during which Lloyd Smith and his painfully small audience of six helped each other through merriment and despair.

The second half could go either way. Moving, generally, into a much more heavy political mode, discussing Chinese communism (‘I could have met Chairman Mao’), the legacy of Nazism in northern Norway (‘Blood Road’) and possibilities for the future tempered with the hangover of the past (‘I Have a – recurring – Dream’). This half of the show lurched fairly broadly from the heavy-handed, the laboured and the drawn-out to the quirkily engaging, entertainingly harrowing and mildly confusing.

The audience participation worked a lot better than it might otherwise have, even with the paucity of audience members. Those who took part released something of themselves despite inhibitions and contributed very pleasingly to the development of the show.

I think part of the joy of the show is that Lloyd Smith’s disarming demeanour (relying a lot on his natural gregariousness, open face and emotional athleticism) can allow you licence to take whatever you wish from his work, even the heavier-going sections. My take on the sentiments and meanings behind the show could be entirely at odds with his own intentions, but I don’t think there’s necessarily anything wrong with that.

‘do the right thing… just not right now’ is a show very much worth seeking out (it tours widely – check it out on www.myspace.com/comfortism or by searching for Ashley Lloyd Smith on Facebook, for truly this is a product of that generation) and Ashley Lloyd Smith, should he ever jack in the teaching, has a good deal of potential for success as one of our more charmingly edgy performers.

Reviewed by: Paddy Cooper

http://www.theatre-wales.co.uk/reviews/reviews_details.asp?reviewID=1841