Nick Doody: T'ai-Po

Life is fine and dandy for Nick Doody, he readily admits, towards the end of T'ai-Po. Fame and fortune might have been useful, but he’s much more comfortable with a manageable crowd like this, away from the industry, in a pub basement.  

Still, free venues can have their ups and downs. The Canons' Gait may be a nicer, more suitable comedy venue than many paid locations, but the unpoliced trickle of latecomers loudly bustling into the room ruins Doody’s quietly inventive opening section, a spiky conversation with an airport employee that takes some wicked twists. It’s a shame, as that’s the most interesting section of the show.

Not that there’s anything wrong with Doody’s more traditional material. The much-admired comic has some impressive TV writing credits, from Mock the Week to Have I Got News For You, and his mastery of a joke is evident from the lovely takes-a-few-seconds pun in the show’s title. Perhaps the most memorable gag from the gig, in fact, comes during his pre-finale bucket speech.

There are some taut observations along the way, particularly about the British attitude to addictions: smoking, drinking, children. Genuine peril is provided by a bizarrely scary road incident, and Doody finally finds himself feted by the media when he instigates a nationwide hunt for a missing engagement ring: the newspapers don’t know who he is, and often misspell his name.

This show will do little to change that, but it’s a solid, sometimes fiendishly clever hour of stand-up. Arriving early is strongly encouraged.