Andrew Ryan’s show this year sees him look at where he is in his life, how he got here and how he’s enjoying it - or not enjoying it, as the case may be. Andrew looks to his life that he has set up in England, his family back in Ireland and frets about his unmarried status among a rabble of married siblings. He also talks about the struggles of being a non drinker and his past jobs.
Ryan himself was welcoming, cheerful, inoffensive and not unfunny However the whole thing felt a bit more like a chat with a comedian after the show had finished than the show itself.
Andrew’s material largely makes for easy listening and he manages not to venture into crudity for a substantial chunk of the show. His stories all had a promising beginning however the punch lines were a bit anti-climactic. Indeed the whole show started promisingly but never really built up further. It seems therefore that promising is a good word to describe Ryan. He certainly tells a good story, however these stories are currently better described as lightly humorous anecdotes than jokes. His material didn’t have an awful lot of structure either. As a stand up, his talent needs a bit of polish.
He does have a sprinkling of stronger material, such as when he describes his tactics for pushy charity fundraisers on the street. His brief observational section on Scottish people also went down quite well. All this being said, he’s seems like he’d be the kind of guy that’s good at mismatched nattering and first impressions. Ryan himself was welcoming, cheerful, inoffensive and not unfunny However the whole thing felt a bit more like a chat with a comedian after the show had finished than the show itself.
