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Arts & Culture

San Diego Fringe: 'Pretending Things Are A C*ck' Showcases Australia's Jon Bennett

One of Jon Bennett's favorite "Pretending Things Are A C*ck" photos, this one taken in Machu Picchu, Peru.
Jon Bennett
One of Jon Bennett's favorite "Pretending Things Are A C*ck" photos, this one taken in Machu Picchu, Peru.

A Look At One Man's Obsession

You have one more chance to catch Jon Bennett's hilarious and revealing comedy show "Pretending Things Are A C*ck". The final performance is at 3:30 p.m. Monday at the Tenth Avenue Theater as part of San Diego Fringe.

'Pretending Things Are A C*ck'

Final performance Monday, July 7, at 3:30 p.m.

Tenth Avenue Theater, 930 10th Ave., San Diego

Bennett is one of the many international performers who traveled to San Diego for the second annual Fringe festival. Bennett comes from Australia and presents his one-man show, "Pretending Things Are A C*ck." The show is the result of Bennett traversing the globe for three years and gathering photos of him, well, pretending everything from the Statue of Liberty to the Eiffel Tower to Big Ben are his penis. His website describes it as combining "the artistic, phallic-filled photographic display with hilarious and surprisingly heart-wrenching tales from Bennett’s life."

His photos have been collected in a book, and he presents a slideshow of his favorites during his performance. But interspersed with the hilarity of his absurd obsession are personal revelations about growing up with a bullying brother and a stern minister father.

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Bennett's show is tightly scripted and vigorously performed. He charms us, makes us laugh, and surprises us by turning what seems at first glance to be nothing more than a juvenile pursuit of an epic penis joke into an engaging personal story.

So he breezes through many of the photos but stops for his favorites to give us the backstory and to win us over. This is another great show to check out at San Diego Fringe, and it's very representative of the Fringe's audacious spirit.

Here's a short interview with him on the rooftop of Tenth Avenue Theater in San Diego after his Sunday show. It does include explicit content.

San Diego Fringe: Jon Bennet on 'Pretending Things Are A C*ck'