Felicity Ward: Irregardless

Full disclosure: I am predisposed to like any show that rages against abuses of the English language. So it comes as a disappointment that, despite an ironically bastardised title, Felicity Ward only spends a few minutes mocking those fools who say ‘irregardless’ when they mean ‘irrespective’ or ‘regardless’. If a comedy show can’t justify your innate snobberies, then what is it for?

Well, in Ward’s case, it is for creating a giddy bubble of auto-tuned, generation-hopping, audience-stoking joy. And on this evidence, she is right. Who needs a diatribe against using ‘bet’ as the past tense of ‘beat’, when you have a punter singing an R’n’B slow jam with Ward via an app that makes him sound like T-Pain?

Ward, you see, is wired to the moon. Like an over-caffeinated gym instructor, she never lets the audience rest. But such is her charm, she carries everyone with her on her whippet-like shoulders, almost literally.

This is a turbo-charged show full of restless energy and handbrake-turn changes of subject and form. She blames her hyperactivity on anxiety (she worries about how ridiculous a profession comedy is), but it accounts for a remarkably high jokes-per-minute ratio, most of which hit the mark.

In one five-minute burst Ward segues from an imagined German sitcom to a vicious take-down of Mary Poppins to a call and response song about monkeys. Only her slightly cruel junkie shtick falls short.

Regardless of the relative lack of linguistic hectoring, Ward has conjured up a gleeful example of what this most ridiculous of jobs is for.