Guest review by Emma Maguire

When I glance around the the­atre before What a Coun­try and notice that I’m def­i­nite­ly the youngest per­son in the audi­ence I realise that I might be slight­ly out of this show’s demo­graph­ic. I also hate coun­try music.

But that’s alright, because Wil­son Dixon’s What a Coun­try man­ages to tran­scend my loathing of all things coun­try and gets me laugh­ing with­in min­utes.

Wil­son Dixon is from Crip­ple Creek, Col­orado, and he is the pic­ture of a gener­ic Amer­i­can coun­try singer. His wife’s left him, and all he’s got left is his gui­tar, his ever-grow­ing fam­i­ly (seri­ous­ly, how many broth­ers does this dude actu­al­ly have?), and a tumul­tuous rela­tion­ship with his horse.

With anec­dotes about fly­ing, ex-wives, alco­holism, and Trump scat­tered between songs such as ‘Ain’t No Good’, ‘Old Lady’s Gar­den’ and ‘Knowl­edge and Wis­dom’, Dixon’s dead­pan deliv­ery is a delight to watch. In par­tic­u­lar, I enjoyed a song called ‘Good­night, Sleep Tight’, a lul­la­by for Dixon’s niece to lis­ten to when her par­ents were fight­ing.

To put it polite­ly, that song def­i­nite­ly doesn’t end the way you’d expect it to.

(Actu­al­ly, that theme runs through the entire­ty of the show.)

Though some of the punch­lines are telegraphed, and a few of them are a tiny bit cringey, What a Coun­try is an excel­lent show to see if you’re into mel­low com­e­dy. The stakes are low, there’s no audi­ence par­tic­i­pa­tion, and you’re free to just lis­ten and relax. The fan­tas­tic songs and an odd­ly charm­ing host are an excel­lent bonus.

Take the chance to sit back, have a beer, and lis­ten to some of the fun­ni­est coun­try songs you’ll ever hear.

(Seri­ous­ly, even if you don’t like coun­try, give this show a go! It’ll grow on you.)

What a Coun­try is run­ning at Tapere Nui in Te Aua­ha in Welling­ton at 7.00pm between now and Sat­ur­day. Tick­ets are sell­ing fast. Get amongst!