Review by Steve Bennett

Phil Zimmerman certainly looks the part - his unkept hair, craggy face, manic eyes and twitchy manner all scream out 'comedian'.

He's very much in the style of Charlie Chuck, barking out non-sequiteurs and fixing on the same phrase time and time again - where Chuck has his donkey, Zimmerman has his pigeons.

It's obviously a gimmick act, but even so the material this nonsense hangs on could do with being stronger. After however many years he’s been doing this, the act still doesn’t really engage the audience.

He can and does raise involuntary chuckles from the ridiculousness of it all, but mostly people tend to sit bemused rather than buying into the lunacy.

The circuit needs its nutters, it's vaudeville throwbacks – yet it takes more than yelping nonsense to make an act.

Sometimes, Zimmerman mocks every comic's insecurity by barking 'How'm I doing?' and 'Does it need tweaking?' The short answer is yes.

Review date: 1 May 2005
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett