Joe Leather turns garbage to gorgeousness in charming performance
I tried to think of a good bin-based pun to open this review, but they were all rubbish. (Sorry). We’ll leave the jokes to comedian and theatre maker extraordinaire Joe Leather, whose show Wasteman returns to VAULT festival after a sell-out run at the Camden Fringe. Tickets were again sold out on the night I saw the show, and for good reason – Wasteman is a highly polished, sharply funny ‘love letter to hard-working northerners and gender euphoria’, in Joe’s words, and a fabulous night out is guaranteed in their excellent company.
The OffFest-nominated writer and performer opens with the brilliant original number ‘One Man’s Treasure Is Another Man’s Trash’, complemented by a floor-length lace dress in an eye-popping shade of Hi-Vis yellow. This is the winning entry to a dream drag contest, with us as the imaginary audience – it must be a dream, we are told, because their wig is lace-front, for a start. So begins a story about following said dreams, finding joy and beauty in the unlikeliest of places, and turning garbage into something gorgeous.
Based on Leather’s experiences while working as a Refuse Loader over lockdown, Joe paints a picture of their world in intimate detail. At 7am, the energy drink starts kicking in, giving them palpitations, which they’ve heard are very slimming. They negotiate a workplace in which hyper-masculinity and heterosexuality are the norm, with colleagues forever asking about The Mrs: everyone at work assumes they’re straight, because they’ve ‘got a deep voice and IBS’. Joe’s facing bigger issues at home, however, with a problematic boyfriend who can’t stand drag (‘why can’t gay men just be men?’), forcing them to bin their costumes and makeup. In the fallout of their relationship, they turn to Grindr with an emphasis on their manual labour job in their profile, selling the working man’s fantasy. Ironically, they find that the reflective jacket of their trade tends to make them more invisible in everyday life.
Joe finally gets a chance to fulfil their gender-euphoric performing potential in the Miss Stoke drag contest, practising the splits with the aid of spiritual youtube yoga sensation Tiffany Quaalude. She may look like her spirit animal’s a tapeworm, but she gets the job done, with Joe making it to the competition and hardly recognising themself in the reflection, feeling like one of the girls. A tender, big-hearted and frequently hilarious show, you’d be hard pressed to find better quality at the VAULT festival.
This is the last year VAULT festival will be staged at its home under Waterloo, with the venue stating its commitment to larger commercial work, and the festival’s future under threat. VAULT is vital for the showcasing of fringe theatre and new voices in the arts, and the #SaveVAULT fundraising campaign has been launched with the goal of raising £150,000 by the end of the current festival’s end on 19th March. Go to https://vaultfestival.com/save-vault/ to find out more and help if you can, or alternatively a great way to support the festival is to buy a ticket to an upcoming show, a drink or some merch at VAULT this year.