Review of the Times political commentator's comedy show

He writes the second most amusing column in the Saturday edition of The Times… but when he takes to the stage, political commentator Matt Chorley demonstrates how far those skills are from proper stand-up.

In Who Is In Charge Here?, the journalist takes a whistle-stop tour through all the stupid things politicians have said done in the past couple of years – so he’s not short of raw material.

But that’s also the problem. Just repeating something idiotic  like ‘the Prime Minister was ambushed by a cake’ or Boris Johnson ‘is not a complete clown’ already gets a knowing chuckle.  ‘This stuff writes itself’ goes the cliché, and all Chorley has to do is repeat it with a comic emphasis - ‘Ambushed?! By a cake?!’ to get a slightly bigger laugh. But exaggerated incredulity doesn’t seem enough.

He reasserts every image you already have of senior politicians. Nadine Dorris is dumb, Priti Patel loves to act tough, Rishi Sunak is all about the image, Keir Starmer is boring, Matt Hancock is a bit handsy…

As you might expect, given his background, Chorley can coin an amusing phrase, and there are flourishes of witty savagery. But they are few and far between in a show that’s too flat and too lecturey, delivered with rhythms Chorley’s seen comedians adopt, without having an innate understanding of them.

There’s quite a lot of sluggish exposition as he reminds the audience of each story he’s mentioning, sometimes involving some quite  obscure figures. Most of the show is performed with a Minister’s quote on screen to hoist them by their own petards as he picks apart the obvious stupidity (though makeagif.com also contributes to the graphics).

Topical comedy dates quickly these days, yet Chorley will skim over full-on war in Ukraine to spend five minutes on a clearly manipulated poll he ran on his Times Radio show 18 months ago that voted Jeremy Corbyn the best Prime Minister Britain never had.

But mocking Labour goes down well with his audience in commuter-belt Surrey. It’s an archetypal Times bunch – very middle-class, very middle-aged, very white – there’s even a murmur of support for their local MP, one Jeremy Hunt. But to be fair there’s little tangible love for the Tories that are the subject of Chorley’s ad hominem attacks. either.

Nothing too wrong with attacking politicians personally, especially given the coterie of shifty, lying, self-serving charlatans at the top of the heap at the moment. But Chorley very much hunts with the pack, offering neither new lines of attack nor greater commentary on how we got here.

The sort of political wonks likely drawn to his show are, you would think, likely to know all he says already. Yet one of the best reactions comes when he calls the Prime Minister’s wife ‘Carrie Antoinette’: a good joke, but a very longstanding one. Chorley’s a knowledgable political commentator, but struggles with the extra mile to convert that into a strong evening’s comedy.

» Matt Chorley: Who Is In Charge Here? is on tour until April 7. Matt Chorley tour dates.

Review date: 25 Feb 2022
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
Reviewed at: Farnham Maltings