The Cracker pulls a David on the Comic Goliaths #SimukaComedy

For a debut show as a professional comic, Gift the Cracker sure made his mark last night. It’s even more awesome because not only did he outshine his mentors, but he did so even when everyone was all fired up!

Before the show we thought the comic war was going to be just between Doc and the Comic King, and that the Cracker would probably put up a fairly good fight, but no! The war even started on the open mic platform. The guys were so on point that we still cannot decide who our fav was, well sort ofJ.

Next time you hear a girl go “ah! I don’t know you” (direct translation of hameno iwewe), “duty” for chores and “I was so bored” for annoyed, lol think of Simba who has the nerve to bluntly diss the “ghetto chick” as he puts it. Then there was Tavengwa who had punch line after punch line, ‘Mr Sort of’ who had everybody adopting his catch phrase (yeah you guessed it) – sort of, and Louis the Prince of Comedy who did a FINE close to the open mic platform. Simuka is definitely cruising on a whole new wave this 2014!

When the battle moved from the open mic to the pros, the night couldn’t have gotten any better. By the way, Doc Vikela was hosting and well, who else but him could have done such an awesome job. His very entrance got the huge audience that had filled The Book Café to the brim all excited. And then he just had to kill us with his idea of the perfect Zimbabwean punch line:

“Why go so far to look for pick up lines. You hear someone say ‘are you from Tennessee? Coz you the only ten I see’, or ‘are you from Jamaica? Coz you Jamaican me crazy!’ We are in Zimbabwe! Use relevant stuff like ‘are you related to Makandiwa? Coz when I saw you, my manhood enlarged!” laugh out loud!!!

And then it was The Cracker’s time to shine. He had us cracking up at every turn! I mean, I heard a number of people shouting “that guy is bad!” several times! Throughout his set, I could see everybody gasping for air from laughter, people shaking their heads in disbelief at how someone could have them laughing like that. He even got a standing ovation! The long and short of it all African women, Gift The Cracker was PHENOMENAL last night!!! And his impression of His Excellency – that was just nothing short of sensational!

The whole time I was enjoying his set though I was thinking ‘oh my! The Comic King must be sweating backstage’. It so just cannot be good to hear people roaring in laughter like that before it’s your turn. But The King did not disappoint. With his impressions of the Southern American and English accents, you could not help but double over!

And just to spice it up, the show ended with a piece from an established poet – Chirikure Chirikure. He did his Ndove (Dung) piece and well, there could not have been a better ending. The man should seriously consider stand up comedy as well because for a while I even forgot it was a poem he was doing. He certainly was one of the crowd favourites.

Thumbs up to Gift for an impressive evolution and showing the comic giants that even underdogs are made of good stuff.  And to Simuka of course, for putting up a great show.