The host for this chat show is Mark Olver, a stand up who has supported Russell Howard on tour and is the warm-up for such television favourites as Deal or No Deal and Vicar of Dibley. As a host he is indeed warm, affable and comfortably chummy with guests and audience alike. His guests on this occasion were Richard Osman, co-host of Pointless and creative director at Endemol; Matt Kirshen from NBC’s Last Comic Standing; David O’Doherty, winner of the 2008 Edinburgh Comedy Award and Lloyd Langford whom I want to adopt.
The opening gambit of ‘what made you want to become a stand-up?’ was responded to in a variety of ways as you would expect. Langford admitted that at a freshers’ gig at his university, he agreed to get his hair cut on stage by ‘wobbly’ comedian Francesca Martinez and decided he wanted to be up there instead of down with the audience, simple as.
There is a small problem with reviewing this show, since it will be different tomorrow, with different guests and a different train of thought. Today’s topics of conversation were the emotional stability of stand-ups, the difficulty of getting good comedy onto the telly, the enigma of ‘Don’t Scare the Hare’ and ‘Two Pints of Lager’ and the future of television production via new platforms. The audience were invited to ask questions which were then discussed by the panel. There was no dancing and no-one mentioned architecture.
This is a fine way to spend an hour with the comedians you would otherwise see performing their sets, but in a very relaxed atmosphere.
