Vlismas’s latest comedy show takes a wrong turn

This sort of thing usually gets left behind at the theatre and nobody remembers it after the show concludes. Then there are utterances that are so shocking that as an audience member you will consider them for some time to come – even if the comedian swiftly moves on to the next gag.

John Vlismas’s latest one-man show, Revelations, included a lot of the latter and masked it with the former. When the mostly white Lyric Theatre audience gasped and roared with laughter at some of the racially biased, stereotyped material, the few black members in the crowd dropped their jaws in shock. But with the house heaving, they may have found themselves wondering if they were perhaps overreacting.

It was predictable when he introduced the “John Vlismas Roast of Jacob Zuma” that more racist vitriol would follow. Vlismas expressed disgust at how the majority of South Africans voted Zuma back into power after these elections and how a fire pool can be a security feature for a black family.

At this point some black audience members started exiting the venue. Vlismas’s comedy treads a thin line: his material can easily be construed as racist, even as it makes a point of satirising the daily existence of his white audience members. His stand-up is direct, but it is possible for some of it to be lost in translation, and as a result polarise his crowd.