After a few min­utes of tech­ni­cal issues — which may have been an actu­al ghost in the the­atre, who knows! — we’re brought into this show by James Mustapic talk­ing about being unem­ployed, to which sev­er­al peo­ple in the audi­ence cheer in unfor­tu­nate acknowl­edge­ment (myself includ­ed).

Mustapic is going to do a “prop­er stand-up show”, he reit­er­ates sev­er­al times, before the pro­jec­tor behind him is pos­sessed by a ghost wear­ing a Scream mask, and we’re thrown through sev­er­al of James’ Repressed Mem­o­ries by the ghost, all of which are pro­ject­ed up on the screen, and relent­less­ly mocked with some qual­i­ty memes.

If you’ve seen any of his con­tent for The Spin­off, this show fol­lows much the same vein. It’s absolute­ly a show for mil­len­ni­als, or at least peo­ple up with the times around pop­u­lar meme cul­ture, and feels fun and ground­ed, at least to some­one my age.

James talks about his love for cats, Sens­ing Mur­der, Love Your Con­dom PSAs, and even recaps Short­land St (in a seg­ment that prob­a­bly goes on a for a smidge too long). He’s very wit­ty, and knows how to play to a crowd, and I appre­ci­ate the occa­sion­al dip into slight­ly more seri­ous top­ics.

Does the ghost nar­ra­tive get resolved? Well, you’ll just have to go and see the show.

As a fel­low unem­ployed gay 22-year old with anx­i­ety issues, this show res­onat­ed a lot with me, and I wish James well.

I look for­ward to see­ing his future Welling­ton shows!

 

The Blair Witch Pro­jec­tor is on at BATS The­atre until the 11th of May 2019. Get your tick­ets here!