Review: Kieran Hodgson Makes America Great Again
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Last Updated 18 June 2025
Kieran Hodgson has become utterly predictable. Every show he does is repetitively and staggeringly brilliant.
His latest — Voice of America — is a star-spangled stunner that'll have you yee-ha-ha-ha-ing from start to finish. Very nearly from start to finish, anyway.
Hodgson was always a fan of America. His favourite film is Home Alone. His favourite food is cereal. And then, in the doldrums of the live circuit lull immediately post-Covid, he scored a bit part in Hollywood superhero movie The Flash, as 'Sandwich Guy'. The Yorkshire-born Brahms fanatic's American Dream was about to be realised, and with it, a chance to prove to his parents that not everything Stateside is "American rubbish". Off to the Warner Bros. backlot (Watford) he bounded.
By now, Hodgson — who's bowled over audiences and critics again and again with shows like '75 and Maestro — can trot out this kind of nostalgic-storytelling-turned-universal-observation with his eyes closed, but he always does it so bloody well. Wince-inducing mishaps turn to gladsome, coming-of-age moments (his teenage stab at attending Spring Break in Florida winds up with Hodgson befriending geriatric Wagner aficionados at the Lincoln Center). Hodgson's mimicry of politicians is magical as ever, including a pin sharp JFK, and — because it's got to be done— Maggie Thatcher at a four-year-old's birthday party ("Many happy returns of the day, young man — now why are you crying?!).
One impression Hodgson refuses to roll out is that of a certain orange-faced monster. But as the casting directors of the superhero movie begin having second thoughts about his American accent, the comedian is forced to peel back the candied facade of a country he adores for Hotel California and Cookie Dough ice cream, to uncover the sour truth festering behind it. Voice of America's gut punch of a denouement is anything but a Hollywood ending.
Kieran Hodgson: Voice of America, Soho Theatre, until 25 June. It's also on at the Edinburgh Fringe from 30 July-24 August.
