A Night With Beau Tyler

Last night we went to see Beau Tyler (aka Peter Feeney) on his recent tour in which he mocks the oft-advertised self-styled help gurus as he sets showcases his unique one hour 'Failure Focused Personal seminar'.

I'd never heard of Beau Tyler until recently when he appeared in a Tip Top Memphis Meltdown series of television commercials playing on a theme of a similar vein as motivator of personality championing 'man-sized' hokey-pokey ice-cream and not settling for anything less.

We arrived early, walking in on the man himself who was with his wife and child. He was extremely approachable and spoke briefly to us, told us to enjoy the show and disappeared into the backstage area.

Not long afterwards, his technical assistant (for want of a better word) took photographs of us appearing happy and sad which would later be used in the performance. Having already met the man and been guaranteed to have some part in the evenings show, I was eager to for the curtains to rise.

The initial enterance and energy of the first twenty minutes was solid and the audience, for the most part, played their part and went with the flow.

As with any performance with public interaction, a difficult participator can make or break the act and unfortunately, Beau chose someone that had little interest in playing along and brought the vibe down a notch. In deference to this, Beau didn't let any of this phase him and did the best he could with the man in question for the remainder of the segment.

As a concept and show, it was certainly unique and interesting. It highlighted the absurdity of profession, poked a lot of fun at it and made us all laugh along. However, with the success of the performance based on audience participation, it is here where the make or break of Beau's act must be judged and on this occasion it was a good show.

Beau Tyler Website