Dave Sedaris trades in astute cultural observations, sardonic wit and crippling self-deprecation and as those who are familiar with his work will attest, business is good. The dude makes Jerry Seinfeld look like an unperceptive killjoy with zero self awareness.
It’s hard to pin down his appeal but at the risk of sounding vague – Sedaris gets it. I’m not too sure what it is but I know he gets it. He’s an extremely perceptive individual you see. If I had to attribute his success to anything however, it’d be Sedaris’ ability to transform the foibles of human nature from a depressing web of shame and failure into something we can all laugh about. Repeatedly.
Japanese translation fails? Hilarious. Personal struggles to quit smoking? Laden with self-deprecation. Failed masturbation attempts in a nudist camp? All of the above.
And with his work featuring in Esquire and The New Yorker, Sedaris blissfully inhabits that essayist middle ground – more scope than Chuck Klosterman’s “low manifestos” and less pompous than McSweeney’s scribe Dave Eggers. Anyway I’ll cut to the chase because this is beginning to read like a failed attempt at masturbation and it’s neither funny nor perceptive.
Dave Sedaris is coming to Australia to perform readings, monologues and other spoken word tomfoolery in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and Perth. If you have a sense of humour or are human we strongly suggest you join him.
Dates for An Evening With David Sedaris are as follows:
Fri, 15 January – Tivoli Theatre, Brisbane
Sat, 16 January – State Theatre, Sydney
Mon, 18 January – Hamer Hall, Melbourne
Tues, 19 January – His Majesty’s Theatre, Perth
