Sam Serrano takes to the stage with an audience of just six people, delivering an energetic, relentlessly funny performance. At the heart of Mars is Serrano’s experience of a hate crime: freezing, feeling ashamed of their queer identity, and ironically calling the perpetrator gay’ for running away afterwards. This darkly funny wit persists as he reappropriates homophobic rhetoric throughout, from skits on parents who assume teaching queerness means discussing ‘bumming’ to a bit on small towns so short on visibly out people they just get named after Serrano: ‘Sam’s’.”

Beneath the hilarity, political edge meets compassion. Serrano’s account of performing queer comedy in small, conservative communities, and the backlash that follows, unfolds into tender observations on ignorance and ingrained homophobia. It’s an outlook that decentres the urban experience, a refreshing perspective at the Fringe, where metropolitan queer narratives often dominate. A looseness occasionally shows as Mars swings from rich people’s cocaine habits to trans rights without warning, held together more by instinct than structure. The hour lacks polish and threatens to lose momentum but many comedians would falter with this small crowd; Serrano utilises the intimacy to create a captivating, inviting performance and produces a hidden gem.

Sam Serrano: Mars, The Stand 4, until 30 August, 9.35pm.