Luke Wright brings Joy to Diss

Posted on 21st September 2024

Luke Wright has appeared at the Corn Hall countless times with performances ranging from Poetry Nights, where new material is road tested in an informal setting, to the masterful long form trilogy of Johnny Bevan, Frankie Vah and Logan Dankworth. His new show, Joy, is pitched somewhere between the two – a loosely connected series of poems set within a structured show. Newly married and in his forties, Wright finds himself happy in his skin, something that seems to have taken him by surprise. Joy, he explained, was the word that best summed up how he was feeling right now and the obvious title for his latest show.

There was still room for his trademark silliness with Tricks – a paean to indulgence that warmed the audience up nicely. We got a sestina – a complex poem that uses a specific pattern of word repetition so complex he needed to show us a chart to explain it. There was room too for his pet project, the univocal poem. All ‘a’s was a task and a half – a crazy plan that was hard graft. ‘Bard Wars’ was part wacky art, part smart craft. A sharp knack, fast talk and brash charm had happy fans clap. What a star!

Otherwise, in a shift away from the narrative of The Toll and the comedy of Essex Lion, he revealed his introspective feelings towards the circumstances in which he finds himself. Admittedly, a highlight of the evening was a laptop accompanied poem about YouTube food content creators that owed a fair bit to the Sleaford Mods, but otherwise this was arguably his most personal show to date. Wright shared his feelings for his son, his wife, his stepmother, his childhood and adoption, all the while blurring the line between poem and conversation in a way that was candid, heartfelt and moving.