Delulu Express

Watching Zakir Khan do stand-up comedy is to reckon with the limitations of the art form and the possibilities of it. It is to witness regular observations carry the weight of a punchline and existential thoughts take flight with the lightness of humour. It is to see a man holding the audience in thrall even with his silence. Tathastu in 2022 was a genre-defying set that wrapped thoughts about his parents, concerns about mortality, and filial resentment in humour without punctuating them with gags. His latest Delulu Express does something similar without reiterating the format or style. It is a lighter arrangement imbued with excessive style and multiple characters. On paper it is more chaotic but beats with the same narrative heart that Khan has been honing since Tathastu.

Watching a Zakir Khan stand-up special is like watching that funny friend from your childhood actually find his true calling. It’s sort of moving, because you know for a fact that none of those friends took their talent seriously. Society simply reduces them to a personality type — the witty guy, the joker, the attention seeker, the mischief monger, the crowd pleaser, the yapper. If anything, they barely recognise it as a talent. Khan’s sets often feel like an authentication of such transient, everyday humour. His languid delivery expands the most ordinary details into mini-narratives of being alive. Which is to say: Zakir Khan isn’t a comedian; he’s a very good storyteller with comic timing. He isn’t really funny; he’s funnily real.