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41st Best Standup Ever!41st Best Standup Ever ★★★★

Lowry, Salford

By Glenn Meads in What's On Stage Manchester Posted on Monday, February 25th, 2008

Here at WOS Manchester, we rarely get the chance to review comedy but Stewart Lee has the perfect theatrical connection – he co-wrote the ground breaking Jerry Springer – The Opera.

But what of his comedy act? Surely once you have seen one stand up comedian honing their material so that it relates to the audience, you have seen them all. Cue- funny stories rolling off the tongue followed by a spot of batting hecklers back and forth and you have the ingredients for a comedy night out.

But Stew is not your archetypal comedian, as his material bravely confounds all of your expectations. The format for his shows should not work but due to the skill and intelligence of the delivery, it works wonderfully. How many other comedians could repeat the same joke/story from a different angle and make you laugh through your hands?

Lee’s stories are, at times funny and yet quite sardoic, as he recalls his mother’s love of an old Tom O’Connor joke over his own material. We also hear how the BBC pulled the plug on a TV show he was comissioned to write. Their loss and our gain, as this intelligent genre-busting comedian is refreshingly different.

The Evening Standard have described him as a “squashed Albert Finney” which might be due to his disdain of middle England’s poster boy – Daily Mail collumnist Richard Littlejohn.

I particularly loved his take on Carphone Warehouse’s reaction to the Big Brother racism row. But the great thing about this show is the way Stewart seamlessly leaps from one unrelated topic to another. For example March Of The Mallards as opposed to the penguins because these ducks are dirtier and would not have received a U certificate if they were the subject of a documentary!

The audience on the night I went laughed hysterically, as did I. This clever comedian delivers his lines with pauses allowing the audience to guess the punchline. The respect that he gives his fans is reciprocated, as at the Lowry they cheered him to the rafters.

An excellent night out!

Written by Glenn Meads in What's On Stage Manchester on 25th February 2008. Filed Under: 41st Best Standup Ever!, Reviews
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