Tag Archives: Dan Evans

Review – Screaming Blue Murder, Underground at the Derngate, 25th September 2015

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Something very strange was happening at the Screaming Blue Murder comedy night last Friday. For some reason, the atmosphere was really flat. We had a reasonably good-sized audience; regular host Dan Evans was on excellent form; it wasn’t even as though we had a bunch of tee-totallers in with unlubricated chuckle muscles. There was just something lacking. Maybe we all got spooked by the fact that the majority of the front row were police officers. I’m sure they were off duty; and I know for a fact they like a laugh as much as anyone. But I could already tell before Dan did his microphone stand audience response swingometer routine that it was going to be tough going to get much of a response.

We’d seen all three acts before, but I remembered them as all being very good so I hoped that the audience would still react well to them. The quiet atmosphere sadly didn’t suit our first act, James Dowdeswell, who we’ve seen twice before and had gone down a storm both times. He was our headline act on both those occasions and maybe his material works better a little later on in the evening. He still delivered his canny, witty observations with his usual quiet aplomb but they just didn’t make an impact. Plenty to smile at, but not many guffaws. Nevertheless, James gamely carried on to polite applause at the end.

When we came to our second act, Diane Spencer, whom we’d seen back in 2011, I feared the worst. The audience still seemed relatively unresponsive and she started off with a knob gag which bombed; and her surprise at its failure was very obvious. But then she did a very clever thing. She went straight for the clean material, and it started to work. She’d uncovered the fact that, as it seemed to me, the audience was a bunch of prudes. It was only when she’d won our attention and respect with her DIY routine and her stuff about gingers that everything else fell into place. She was really funny, and by the time we got to the end of her act she’d properly loosened up our inhibitions and shown us that it was perfectly acceptable to laugh at carpet burns during sex material. It must have felt like hard work for her at times, but it really paid dividends. We all went into the second interval as much happier bunnies.

We’d also seen our final act, Earl Okin, before, and by the time he came on we were ready for some big laughs. Mr Okin’s persona of being an unlikely sex symbol, together with the relaxed pace of his act of musical parody, hit our assembled funnybones like an accurately struck reflex hammer. I could imagine on some other nights that something more in-your-face and wise-cracking might have been what the people want, but for us weird bunch his subtle, teasing act was just perfect. It takes a lot of confidence to reduce a room to tears of laughter by creating jazz instrument sound effects, but he does it!

Next Screaming Blue in two weeks – here’s hoping for a more “normal” crowd!

Review – Screaming Blue Murder, Underground at the Derngate, Northampton, 11th September 2015

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As we wave a sad farewell to summer (such as it was), and the days start to get a little shorter, and the leaves that are green turn to brown, the great news is that we can welcome back the return of the Screaming Blue Murder comedy nights at the Royal and Derngate. This season has five jam-packed nights of stand up between September and November, four of which we are able to attend.

It was also a welcome return to our genial host Dan Evans; same suit, new gags, which is just how we like it. The first two rows on the left were taken by a big party from the school, regular attendees out of whom Dan has already taken most of the available mick, but fortunately, when he starts asking them questions, we find there’s always room for more. The rest of the front row was promisingly made up of a guy and his harem, so it was quite a surprise to discover they worked in protecting at risk kids; not a lot of humour to be derived from that then.

Our first act was new to us, the excellent Zoe Lyons. Great material, a funny, approachable persona, and a perfectly paced act – confident enough to wallow a while in the build up to a story, sharing the enjoyment of the moment with us. I loved all her observations on the daftness of life – stress-relieving shampoo, daily cleansing routines; and the utter stupidity of the notion of the “one lady owner” when it comes to buying cars. We were in hysterics. Would love to see her do a longer slot!

Next up was Andrew Watts, whom we have seen before – and whose well-received Edinburgh show I deliberately didn’t see because we knew he’d be coming here. He is a really funny chap, with his gentlemanly cricketing analogies and his way of handling those crises every man faces when clothes shopping with his woman. His material was probably 90% the same as we saw three years ago, but it’s funny enough to enjoy a re-listen. His strength is in that marvellous juxtaposition between respectable exterior and a rather sinful brain. Anyone who can get an audience member to consider necrophilia has got to be a good bet!

Our headline act was Carey Marx, again new to us, although he’s been doing this kind of stuff for a while now – and it shows, in a good way! Supremely confident, wonderfully relaxed, seemingly effortlessly pulling material out of thin air, although I’m sure it’s all well planned and performed with military precision. Reflections on manbags, the etiquette of hugging, how to refer to people of restricted growth without causing offence, and gays creating tornados all played a part. A total crowd-pleaser, with a constant high level of laughter from the start that hardly ever died down.

An amazing return for Screaming Blue, one of those delightful occasions when all four performers were on the top of their game. Can’t wait for two weeks’ time. You should come too!

Review – Screaming Blue Murder, Underground at the Derngate, Northampton, 17th April 2015

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Once more into the breach at the Underground for another Screaming Blue Murder. Another full, hot house (keep those doors open, and don’t bring a jacket), with Dan Evans compering once again. This week he had the usual front row teachers – their comedy value is on the wane now, I feel; two rows containing a very demure hen party (well, his mother was one of them so I don’t suppose they had much choice),a lady from Duston who thought she was from Dunstable and a chap who worked for a secret department at Weetabix. We had a nice chat with him and his girlfriend during one of the intervals, where we delved deeper into the mysterious activities at the cereal manufacturer and as a result there’s no way I’m revealing what’s going on there. Who would have thought it? Dan of course was on excellent form as usual, and got us all in a relaxed and thoroughly chucklesome mood.

Our first act was new to us, Joey Page, a very funny young chap with rather esoteric material, and a voice like Spitting Image’s Mick Jagger (if you can remember that far back). He has a lot of terrific material about still living at home with Mum and Dad – and the difficulties that creates when bringing a girl back. I also liked his nicely made-up facts, especially the one about Prince Philip and his cleaners. As a climax, if that’s the right word, we were treated to a performance of his one act play, “Hands”. Delightful sense of the ridiculous, and a very engaging comic. Most impressive!

The second act, whom we have seen three times here before, was Sally-Anne Hayward. She’s very funny in a self-deprecating way and has a great conversational style that really puts you at ease, even though she’ll probably do some toe-curlingly embarrassing stories about sex. She was easily able to bounce off the hens (so to speak) and had some enjoyable observations about all-male and all-female groups going out together. She went down a storm and was absolutely at her best. To be fair, she doesn’t stray much from her previous routines, but what’s not to like?

Our final act, whom we have also seen twice before, was Anthony King, whose act is based on comedy songs on the guitar that reveal (sometimes subtly, sometimes not so) his darker side. He’s the kind of person you’d expect to have buried his neighbours under the patio, and then have a perfectly logical and well-argued reason as to why it was appropriate. His pet centipede never stood a chance. A very assured, confident and clever act, and everyone loved it.

Only one more Screaming Blue this season before the comedians go into the Summer Recess. Sadly we’re unable to go – but you still can!

Review – Screaming Blue Murder, Underground at the Derngate, Northampton, 27th March 2015

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Another sold out night at the Screaming Blue Murder, which simply goes to show what excellent quality and value it is. This week Mrs Chrisparkle and I were not only joined by Lady Duncansby, but also the Sheriff of Shenstone, Lady Lichfield, the young Duchess of Dudley and the even younger Baron Brownhills. We were tempted to complain about the lack of red carpet, but noblesse oblige.

Our regular host Dan Evans was once again tried, tested, weighed in the balance, and found absolutely not wanting. He had to cope with a tanked-up crowd who this week included a large works party from a local builders’ merchant, a loved-up young couple from Towcester, and a birthday girl with her family and friends. But it was the builders’ merchant boys who really got stuck in to do their best to disrupt proceedings. Loudly talking amongst themselves, taking phone calls, getting progressively drunker, thinking they were funnier than the acts…. If in the cold light of day any of you are reading this, take a tip and leave the humour to the professionals, guys. We’d all appreciate it. Dan was of course a master at the game, treading a perfect balance between keeping order and teasing out all the fun of the situation.

First act was Jeremy O’Donnell, whom we’ve seen here twice before, once as a compere and once as the middle act. He’s got a bright, breezy, blokey persona, with lots of good material and a confident delivery. My favourite sequence involved his visiting the toilet on the train which had a soap dispenser but no towel – you had to be there. Very experienced at handling tricky crowds, he got through it beautifully unscathed.

Second up was Wendy Wason, new to us, and very entertaining. A little slow to start, we initially feared she might not fully find her feet. Nevertheless she soon dealt out some really filthy lines and we were fully on her side after that. She had very good material about sex, family life, and more sex, and I thought the young Duchess of Dudley was going to have a heart attack at her line about her decision criteria on the Spit or Swallow question. Extremely funny, and she went down very well with the crowd.

Our headline act was Christian Reilly, an old hand at these Screaming Blues, whom we’ve seen many times before and who was indeed the runner-up in the coveted Chrisparkle Award for Best Screaming Blue Comic in 2013. He has a brilliant act involving musical parodies with the aid of his old guitar, a rather goofy straw Stetson, great confidence and terrific timing. Bang up to date with the Jeremy Clarkson material! I don’t specifically know what those builders’ merchant guys were doing to him in the front row – goading him somehow I think – but he didn’t like it. It’s a slightly risky strategy for the comic to turn on a section of the audience like that – but basically we agreed with him and they deserved their public humiliation. Mr Reilly’s material was excellent enough for both myself and the Sheriff to buy his CDs afterwards.

On reflection it sounds like it was rather a rough, tense night – but not a bit of it, it was excellent entertainment as usual. Three weeks till the next one!

Review – Screaming Blue Murder, Underground at the Derngate, Northampton, 27th February 2015

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Once again it was a full house at the Screaming Blue Murder, with Lady Duncansby procuring the last available ticket just a couple of days ago. Regular host Dan Evans had his work cut out to keep order at first, with a number of late arrivals, some of which were rather on the noisy side; some chatty ladies in the front row, some older blokes who carried their years well, a couple who brought their own curry takeaway, a rather vague student from Liverpool University, and, in comparison, the most demure and elegantly well behaved hen party imaginable. But Dan was on excellent form as usual, with an engaging mixture of new and old material that went down a treat. As proof of how good he was, he even sold a few copies of his book.

There was a little uncertainty before our first act appeared, because she should have been our second. Our original first was apparently suffering from something icky in the stomach department and couldn’t be prised out of the loo. Nice way of announcing the guests! So we stared off with Susan Murray, a somewhat regular comic here as this was the fourth time we’d seen her! She’s always good for a laugh, with less accent-based material than usual and more about, well, sex. With jokes about vaginas being too big and the positioning of a six-inch tattoo on her thigh, there was more than enough to get your teeth into, so to speak. By bouncing off the Liverpool student, she did quite a lot of scouse jokes, which rather alienated Lady D – pick on any part of the country and you’re bound to offend someone somewhere.

Our second act, who should have been our first, was Paul T Eyres, who was new to us, a bright, entertaining young chap with lots of good material about class, relationships and kids. I enjoyed his confident delivery and easy style with the audience. A superb performance if he was actually suffering from a dicky tummy. One to watch, methinks.

Our headline act was someone we’ve seen twice before, the splendid Markus Birdman. Winner of the Chrisparkle award for Best Screaming Blue Murder Standup in 2013, he has an amazing lightness of touch combined with genuinely fantastic material. There was a fair deal of repetition from his act a couple of years ago, but like New York, it’s so good you can hear it twice. There’s no finer joke to be heard than his one about the “speed of ejaculate”, trust me on this one. Since we last saw him he’s now coping with having a ten-year-old daughter and a marriage breakup, which in typical Birdman fashion becomes the springboard for lots of brilliant observational comedy. I admit it, I’m a fan.

Next show is in two weeks. You’d better book up quickly!

Review – Screaming Blue Murder, Underground at the Derngate, Northampton, 6th February 2015

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Another full house at the Screaming Blue Murder last Friday, which is great news for everyone. This week Mrs Chrisparkle and I were joined by Lady Duncansby for her first Screaming Blue of the year. Where else can you get three super acts and a fantastic host for just 12 quid? That’s only £3 per performer – and chucking in the two lovely intervals for free! Dan Evans was once again in charge, working his way through the front rows, as only he can, mining for comedy nuggets. We had the return of teacher Rob and his mates from the previous show, but Dan didn’t concentrate on them as they were so last fortnight. Instead we were all curious about a romantic assignation between a probation officer and her client – you couldn’t make it up. Lots of fresh new material from Dan to enjoy as well, which gets the evening off to a terrific start.

In a change to the published programme, our first act was Matt Green. New to us, he had a set full of really funny observations and jokes, much of which was based on his domestic life with his wife. I particularly liked the segment about the fantasy of having sex on a bed covered with money; and also the comparison of people checking the emails on their phones whilst they’re meant to be having a conversation with the equivalent in the old days of their bringing out a stack of letters to sift through. A great opener, he went down very well with the crowd.

Next up was Sofie Hagen, also new to us, a Danish comic who successfully trades on her (dubious) lack of confidence with the English language and who is happy being on the more comely side of a size 14. She comes across as being a really nice girl which gives added oomph to her unexpected twists of verbal coarseness and the apparent ease with which you could invite her to bed. She has a relaxed, unhurried style to accompany her very funny material about not over-exerting oneself. All in all a surprising act, and one that worked very well.

Our final act was Ian Cognito, whom we have seen here before, when he went down a storm but I found him a bit unsubtle. Well this time, to use the common parlance, he smashed it. With incredible self-assurance, using the entire room, paced to perfection, he pitched his faux-aggressive style just right all the way through and he was brilliant. His material tends to be extended one-liners, but his style elongates them into mini-epics, so you don’t feel you’re missing out on depth. Our audiences tend to be quite “right-on” and we get a bit anxious if we fear the comic might stray into bigotry; so it’s a mark of Mr Cognito’s (who knows what his real name is) skill and success that he can end a really funny joke with “and that’s how you tell a rapist gag”. He looked like he was really enjoying it too. An early contender for a Chrisparkle award.

Three weeks until the next session. Get booking!

Review – Screaming Blue Murder, Underground at the Derngate, Northampton, 23rd January 2015

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Hurrah for the return of a new year of Screaming Blue Murder nights at the Royal and Derngate. If you’ve not been before, for the price of modest main course in a restaurant you get three great comedy acts, two wonderful intervals and one fabulous host. One person who hadn’t been before was HRH the Crown Prince of Bedford, who was on a state visit to Northampton and accompanied us to the show. The prince has a tendency to sit in the front row at comedy shows, a foolhardy act which we tried to resist, resulting in the application of the grand old art of compromise, with our sitting in the second row with him on the central aisle so that he could engage in idle badinage with the comics should they invite him to do so.

Our jovial host was the masterful Dan Evans, with his unerring ability to warm an audience up by mixing a few brief jokes with some teasing of the good sports in the first few rows. With a packed house (Lady Duncansby was too late to get a ticket) Dan had plenty to choose from, and so we were introduced to Rob from Wootton School, a lady with a “don’t go there” back-story about her marriage and a pharmaceutical consultant who couldn’t have been more mysterious if he tried. Actually he did try – a lot.

Our first act was Tiffany Stevenson, whom I remember from the TV series Show Me The Funny, which was a number of things including absolutely fascinating, but sadly hardly ever funny. She comes out with bundles of attack, oodles of confidence, and a lot of top quality material. She had some good observations about binge culture – whatever that might be – as well as maintaining that all men are gay (to a certain extent) because they love their own penis. I’d have thought the definition of gay was loving other men’s penises, but there you go. I’m delighted to say that I’m one of the few people on this planet who don’t know who the Kardashians are, but even so I could tell that her routine about them was highly entertaining. By the way, my autocorrect changed Kardashians to Lard Ashrams, which might not be that inappropriate, from what I understand. Miss Stevenson engaged with the Prince on the subject of age and hangovers, and I got the sense she quite fancied him. Very funny, very lively and pacey – a great opener to the evening.

Second up was Joe Lycett, whom we have seen here before and whom I remembered as being very good value. A doyen of young middle-class camp, his engaging conversational style gets you on his side right from the start, and we spent a half hour or so of idle chitchat that didn’t really go places but nor did it matter. He ended his set, like he did in 2012, with an amusing account of a difficult email conversation – it must be his stock in trade. This time it was about having to pay 30p to use the toilets at Euston Station, a fee about which Mr Lycett was not unreasonably peeved. Extremely funny, and very popular with the crowd.

Our final act was Roger Monkhouse; again someone I remembered with fond hilarity from his previous Screaming Blue appearance. I hope Mr Monkhouse wouldn’t be offended if I were to say that facially he reminds me of what E.T. would look like if he was a General Practicioner. He has a rather quiet, intellectual style that gives him a good sense of authority when talking about politics and Other Important Issues. He also ended up directing some of his material at the Prince – including apologising for the state we’ve got the nation into and that his generation is going to have to pay for. Often political stuff doesn’t go down that well in Northampton, but Mr Monkhouse certainly hit our collective funnybone – maybe because it’s a general election year we’re going to be more attuned to it in 2015.

A great start to the season – next one is on February 6th. You really ought to come!

Review – Screaming Blue Murder, Underground at the Derngate, Northampton, 21st November 2014

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The Underground was completely packed for the final night of this season’s (and this year’s) Screaming Blue Murder comedy nights – which meant people arriving late not only had the ignominy of being picked on by our host Dan Evans (in rip-roaring form) but they also had to stand around whilst new chairs were sourced from other parts of the building. Dan was also able to warm us up nicely by finding out all about the people in the front row, including Peter the rather bashful Civil Engineer, Charlie who was most definitely not his girlfriend, and two “beautiful couples” including a 25th birthday boy, who was given Jimmy Carr tickets as a gift – cue lots of entertaining jealousy humour from Dan.

All the acts were new to us this week, and I reckon that’s the first time I’ve been able to say that in over three years, so we were very excited at the prospect. First act was Pierre Novellie, an imposing chap with a bushy beard and polite and friendly persona, the occasional “f word” notwithstanding. He had some nice material about the fact that, as he is of white South African heritage, racists assume he is “one of us”; and there was also some enjoyable stuff where he gives monotonous but appropriate lyrics to film scores. But I felt his approach was almost too gentle, and a lot of his material felt like padding, waiting for a punchline that might or might not eventually happen. He started his act with a good ten minutes about his name, most of which was quite boring I’m afraid. If he got some new material his act could go places – but as it stands, he’s paddling in the shallow end at the moment.

However, he was a comic genius in comparison with our second act, Lou Sanders. She looks like she’s going to be jolly, and she did have some good material in a quirky sort of way – her chat with an audience member being on Tinder was pretty good – but for some reason she didn’t build up a rapport and when she ran out of material a bit too early, something of a car crash ensued. She announced that she’d be doing her final joke, but it wasn’t that good and didn’t lead to much of a laugh; then she confessed she’d run out of things to say (they were written on her hand) and, realising she still had five minutes to do, panicked a little and it all came across as though she was begrudging us her time and attention. She had just started another joke she said would definitely be the last, when a heckle from the back put her off and she just decided she’d stop there and wouldn’t carry on. This created a surge of embarrassment-led sympathy from the front rows but she was adamant that there was no point in carrying on and that her act wasn’t for everybody.

The headline act was Sean Meo, and at last we had a comic who knew how to be funny. An older chap, much more experienced, full of attack and vigour, who created an excellent rapport with the audience, using some extremely good material, delivered with terrific timing. Even so, I found one element of his act dangerously close to offensive, when he had some material about “midgets” (his choice of terminology), saying that we “tolerate” them, but don’t look at them and ignore them, which counts as disablist content in my view. Still, his masterful delivery and jokey blokey personality allowed him to get away with it, and he went down very well with the audience.

So not the best comedy night ever, but not the worst either. Let’s hope the great turn-out for last Friday’s show continues when the next season comes along in the New Year. Can’t wait!

Review – Screaming Blue Murder, Underground at the Derngate, Northampton, 7th November 2014

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It was just about to happen yet again. Mrs Chrisparkle and I had taken our carefully selected seats on the aisle of the third row which is normally just far enough back to be out of participatory reach of the comics, but close enough to feel involved. However, recently there haven’t been quite so many people coming to the Screaming Blue Murder, and we’ve ended up as default front row, as everybody filed in and sat behind us. Same again this week. With one minute before “curtain up”, no one had sat in front of us. Sigh. I was practising in my head my responses to the usual questions a comic will ask the audience members. “What do you do here in Northampton?” “I tend to write about things I see at the Royal and Derngate”. But then – bliss, as a late arriving veritable coachload of punters (teachers at a local school) trooped in after scoffing down a rushed meal at the restaurant across the road and provided Dan Evans (MC) and the other comedians a feast of material for the rest of the evening.

It was a welcome return for Dan, who’s not been well recently, poor lad, but he was back on fine form and warmed us up tremendously with new and old material and comedy gold badinage with the schoolteachers. It was the Assistant Principal (Maths) guy who made it so easy. Apparently he was sitting there with a face like a slapped arse, and from my angle looked as though he wanted the earth to swallow him up. There were other late arrivals too, whom Dan interrogated thoroughly before they’d even had a chance to locate some seats. Woe betide the Late Arrivals at the Comedian’s Ball.

Our first act was Matt Price, whom I thought we hadn’t seen before but as his routine developed, we both remembered him from our very early days at Screaming Blue Murder, before I started blogging, circa 2009. He has a terrific comic persona, that of an ungainly and somewhat overweight Cornishman with a tendency to sacrifice politeness for honesty. He saw the Assistant Principal (Maths) guy as a personal challenge, and despite giving us a hysterically funny set, it sounded like he failed. He did some nice sequences including white kids who think they’re black, which I have heard others do, but then matched with black kids who think they’re white, which gave it a very enjoyable balance. He told us of his experiences of performing in Broadmoor (which was what we remembered from years back), and a perfect one-liner involving an unfortunate sexual act with someone with a prosthetic limb. He went down extremely well.

Next was Benny Boot, who we definitely hadn’t seen before. Australian, and extremely anarchic, he occasionally built up a really good comic momentum but had a tendency to throw it away with poor timing or inadequate punchlines. He’s the kind of guy you’d dread having as a friend because he will just say the most inappropriate thing at the wrong time, and leave you squirming with embarrassment – as he did when he just went into too much personal interrogation with one of our regular comedygoers who happens to be blind. Not sure how embarrassing it was for the blind guy himself, but enquiring deeply into the nature of his disability simply wasn’t funny – and he definitely lost the majority of the audience as a result. A perfect example of going down the wrong route.

Our headline act was Pierre Hollins, whom we have seen here before in 2010 and 2012. Pierre is good ol’ blokey bloke with hugely confident delivery and very funny material about everyday life and relationships. It was hard for his act to get going because one lady near the back developed a disturbingly loud guffaw which she let rip at least every twenty seconds. Mr Hollins played off it very well and it became the centrepiece for a lot of his routine. Once she started to get tedious, he carefully ignored her and got back on his own track again – very skilfully done. Again, he was very popular with the audience.

Only one more Screaming Blue Murder left this season, in two weeks’ time. You’d be a fool to miss it.

Review – Screaming Blue Murder, Underground at the Derngate, 10th October 2014

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There was quite a turnout from the Chrisparkle contingent at last Friday’s Screaming Blue Murder – my good lady wife and I were not only accompanied by Lady Duncansby and the Duchess of Dallington, but also we had a return visit from Lord Liverpool and the Countess of Cockfosters. I can’t think why Tatler weren’t in attendance.

Our genial host was the one and only Dan Evans, terrific as always at getting everyone loosened up and ready for the fray, although he failed yet again to get some seats in the front few rows filled by the cowards who slunk to the back. Well done Dan for keeping the new material coming, us regulars really do appreciate it! Unfortunately Dan had a bit of a (hope you’re not eating) phlegm problem on Friday, resulting in every so often his turning round and having a really good hack at his throat, like Bob Fleming in The Fast Show. As part of Dan’s interaction with the crowd, we loved his chats with the mysterious Scouser and his daughter the Fraud Investigator, including deciding on the merits and the risks of replying to a letter promising a huge haul of cash from Nigeria.

First of our three acts was Peter White, new to us, and a very funny chap from Canada. He has good attack and forms a nice rapport with the audience, but for some reason decided to pick on me because of the size of my head. It’s true – I do have a very big head. But for some reason Mr White seemed to find it rather scary, which is something no one has ever said to me before. I enjoyed his observation about how at home he’s regular sized but get off the plane in the UK and he’s instantly fat. Made me think I could go to Toronto and enjoy an instant crash diet. Great material about how sex is the only fun you can have where there’s always the risky possibility of a baby being born. We all enjoyed him very much.

Second on, and in a change to the advertised programme, it was the return of Meryl O’Rourke. We’ve seen her three times before, twice as an act and once as the host. She’s always really funny with her jokes about sex and motherhood – but mainly sex; and I also liked her material about finding role models for girls. She had a bizarrely funny line about how a posh lady might be affronted by her jokes (“I hope she doesn’t say ‘vagina’, I’m wearing a pashmina”) which we repeated to ourselves all weekend.

Our last comic, and again new to us, was Brendan Dempsey. What a sterling delivery this chap has! His luxurious Irish accent made the Duchess go slightly doolally at the knees. One of those comics who takes it all precisely at his own pace and with such authority that you just go with it, loving the pauses. He had some fantastic sequences: does long term romance ever blossom from a building site wolf-whistle (that had us in hysterics); how to cope with the legal firm constantly pestering you on the phone when you’ve had an accident; and what goes through a child’s mind when it gets on board an aeroplane. One of the best comics I’ve seen in a very long time – really top quality.

Come on Northampton, get your act together! The numbers attending were still only average – but this is your best value comedy by far! Unmissable fun.