Richard Herring – Hitler’s Moustache DVD

It seems to be the way these days that comedians who plan to have a show in the Edinburgh Fringe Festival hit upon the most ridiculous idea they can and then realise that they have committed to something that can’t be changed after their publicity is prepared months in advance of Edinburgh.

Richard Herring, coming off the success of the previous year’s Headmaster’s Son hit upon the idea of trying to reclaim the Hitler Moustache – or toothbrush moustache as it is properly called. Charlie Chaplin, born only a few days before Hitler, had the same moustache and it became part of his comic look. However nowadays the toothbrush moustache is linked only to Hitler.

So Herring made a commitment to grow the moustache and see what happened to him, how people responded to it and him, and how he would feel with this frowned-upon facial hair.

Amazingly nobody attacked him, the worst that happened was that people laughed at him. Which in a way is what he wanted, to reclaim the ‘tache for comedy.

There appeared to be very little reaction to his moustache, mostly just his own fears, so the show itself ends up just exploring that and concludes with a call for people to actively resist the BNP vote, and to uphold the values in the Chaplin speech from the Great Dictator – where the comedy moustache meets the Nazi moustache.

4/5