Rhys James Prepares

From a generation of comics that grew up assuming standup to be a viable career, 22-year-old Rhys James has enough attributes to make it. Confident bordering on cocky and relatively slick, but with the beta male distinction of being a rake thin, recently graduated English Literature student and the quirk of only having one kidney, he cites the obligatory childhood trauma that made him want to be a comedian.

He knows how to pen and deliver a joke, even if he's still finding his persona. And there are plenty of solidly funny routines in Prepares, such as his pillorying of the age of chivalry and his father's wisdom on dressing for the job you want rather than the one you have. But there's also less inspired material, as with his workaday comparison of romantic poet John Keats and Eminem or his drawn-out musing on CS Lewis's inspiration. Still, he capably intersperses the storytelling with snappier quips. Some are applaudably sharp, others feel like he's trying on misogyny and race-related material for size, striving to work out if they feel right emerging from his mouth. Suffice it to say, not everything flies but his hit rate is prodigiously high.

Happily, more of his real self emerges as the hour progresses, including some amusing tales about his missing kidney, though he's sufficiently accomplished to effectively blur fact and fiction. Once James nails down what makes him unique, a bright future in comedy surely awaits.