Hurrah for another Screaming Blue Murder, and another episode in the continuing mystery saga, Would Dan Evans Get There On Time? Answer: No. This time there was a crash on the M1 which put a 25 minute delay onto his journey. I’m beginning to think The Gods of Comedy have got it in for him. And perhaps they have. Every so often you get a really weird Screaming Blue Murder; something about the dynamic in the audience that just doesn’t gel. This was one of those weeks. Firstly, they’d changed the staging so that it looked really showbiz. Black curtains in front of a lit-up, shimmering red curtain, to create a very glamorous effect. Not the usual cellar where the bodies are kept look that we’re accustomed to. Dan did his usual let’s meet the front row routine, and got on well with the ladies from the Danes Camp gym, and then he moved on to another couple (no names)… and that’s where it all got a bit difficult.

It’s a bit bizarre to have to review the audience rather than the show, but to make sense of the evening, this particular Screaming Blue needs it. So, back to this couple; to be fair, he was fine. A cheery paper salesman whose answer to the problem of the diminishing need to buy paper because of the Internet was to “sell more paper”. Absolutely. She, however… I’m sure she’s a lovely person but she came across as a cross between Rosa Klebb and Lord Snooty. She sells people (her words) and lives in an “undisclosed location” and clearly looks down on Northampton. Normally the audience is quite happy to go along with the usual “What’s Northampton like?” “It’s sh*t” routine, but this time – no. “If you hate it, why don’t you leave then?” came an unexpected bellowing voice from behind. An audience silently quivered, not knowing where this was going. Dan continued with as much jollity as possible, but it wasn’t long before the voice came back with “Get her a lead”, which really was a bit much. If anyone had shouted that out about Mrs Chrisparkle, I would have stood up and demanded satisfaction with a duel in the car park. Instead, Dan turned to a couple of guys in the corner and tried to spark off them but they were as sullen as hell.

First up was Luke Toulson, who came on thanking Dan for putting us all at our ease and making his life easy! We’ve seen Mr Toulson twice before and he’s always good value. He’s done some of the material about collecting the kids from school before, but we loved his pretentious critiques of school plays, and the urge guys get to propose the higher from the ground they are. He ended with a great sequence about the one hour slot to deliver your sperm sample for testing and a great play on words about a medic’s wages. He was just what we needed to set the evening back on course.

Next was Caroline Mabey; we’ve also seen her before and, last time, frankly, she wasn’t very good. This time, well… she’s gutsy and has some good material but I still think she’s trying to be someone on stage that she isn’t. She reminded me very much of a younger Helen Lederer, with an act crammed full of self-deprecation; trouble is she doesn’t really get us on her side at the start of her act, so we end up just being onlookers rather than participators. I can see how it all would work perfectly on paper, but on stage it just doesn’t quite hold together. Mind you, the weird vibe of the evening certainly didn’t help.

What the night needed was for the last act to bounce out, stamp their authority on us, and not let up until the final joke – and that’s exactly what Michael Fabbri did. We’ve never seen Mr Fabbri before and it’s been our loss. He uses his material and sharp delivery to take control without ever being aggressive or too laddish like some comics. There’s a fantastic sequence about spending the night in someone else’s hotel room, but his set was full of sideways looks at life and what I can only describe as inventive moments of ridiculousness. He was great, we’d love to see him again.

There are two more Screaming Blue Murders this year – hopefully they’ll run a little more smoothly than this one did. Alas, we are unable to attend either of them, so I hope you’ll go on our behalf.