Med revue, the annual showcase of med students trying to prove they have a sense of humor, was performed to students, friends and family last weekend. With nothing better to do on a Saturday night, Critic Te Ārohi went along to the finale.
Keeping with tradition, the main plot (something about Rapunzel wanting to go to Castle) was subsidiary to the skits. The skits displayed a range of themes from sex jokes to niche med-related puns to more sex jokes. One skit played on themes of pedophilia, police brutality and drug laws all in one. Will, script writer and skit director, wrote pretty much the entire thing last Summer. “It was a lot of work,” Will said, before hastily adding, “but I’d do it all over again.”
Luckily, there was a screen displaying dictionary definitions after most skits so that all us non-med plebs could understand. Non-med student Emily “found the projections really useful”. Jowan, another non-med student, agreed that “it was really funny”.
This year, med revue leaned on the more marginal side. As expected, penis and cum jokes were coming (hah) in hot. But med revue went a step further with actual nudity and one of the main actors doing a funnel on stage to a standing singing audience. In fact, the audience was instructed to “sing properly in tune” or else a reptile “will kill you”. Anything for audience engagement, right? Speaking of audience members under duress, there were a lot of them; the College of Education was allegedly packed out with around 350 people on finale night.
Auckland medical students and red heads got the short end of the stick with many of the jokes. One Auckland med student, refusing to sit quietly as his reputation was ridiculed, repeatedly yelled “shut up!” Although threats were made getting back at script writers at Auckland’s med revue, apparently, it was all in “good faith”.
At the end of the day, the marginal humor, cringe and genuinely well choreographed dance routines and live music was all for charity. All proceeds went to Attitude NZ, a mental health foundation.