Review of the final

With 14 acts, the final of the Leicester Square Theatre New Comedian Of The Year  competition could have been an interminable affair. But some strong performances, a diversity of styles and tight set times kept things brisk and entertaining.

Opening act Samantha Day could barely scratch the surface of her story of being a single mum, ‘part-time feminist’ and recovering alcoholic who quit a stable accounting job to follow her comedy dreams – all told in a winning West Country burr. Assured without being showy, she’s an engaging comic  with a bit of spice to her material, although she is occasionally guilty of a glib quip  rather than being too sincere. But she set the night off on a solid footing.

From a conservative village and with a plummy accent that wouldn’t be out of place in the Reform Club, Cambridge graduate Will Hall leans into his poshness, with a gaggy, self-deprecating set. He has some stand-out lines – including a doozy about the intersection of his sexuality and his social status – but also a few that veer towards the over-familiar, learned from other comics. He’s also learned stagecraft from them, however, and is a reassuringly confident presence.

From one gay Will to another, with Will Owen proving a master of the casually cruel comment, biting yet delivered with an archetypal Gen Z indifference. Listless and insincere isn’t the easiest attitude to pull off but Owen achieves it, with no small thanks to some strong, unpredictable jokes.  It’s a winning formula – quite literally as his withering wit earned him first place tonight.

With controlled confidence and a vaguely American accent, Philipp Kostelecky – who shared an Edinburgh hour with Hitt this summer – instantly seems like a safe pair of hands, hitting the audience with the traditional ‘who do I look like’ opener, but with a pleasingly original take. That’s typical of this Austrian-American-Slovenian performer, whose strait-laced demeanour conceals a strong sense of the weird… as well as a firm sarcastic streak. He made a strong impression and can consider himself unlucky to have won a place on the podium.

The international flavour continued with Blank Peng, who has only recently started performing comedy in English rather than her native Mandarin. She has a nice line in mischievous jokes about the authoritarian regime that would get her in trouble back home, as well as some bitterly pointed gags about the treatment of women there – and, indeed, Western stereotypes about submissive ‘Orientals’.  Her lack of experience was more apparent than some of the other finalists, but her playful way with national clichés does for China what Henning Wehn does for Germany – and he’s done all right out of that.

Vidura Bandara Rajapaksa also mocks the West, starting with the gap-year types making their charity/Instagram trips to his Sri Lankan homeland before getting deeper into the issues of colonialism, with a sometimes surprising edge. He’s a mesmerising presence, perching on a bar stool and intoning quietly and carefully, letting his wittily sardonic words speak for themselves. This relaxed, thoughtful comic is class act for sure, and secured joint second place.

Dan Jones joked that a recent break-up meant he’d lost 95 per cent of his material, and you could almost believe him as tales of dating in Brighton and the cheese-rolling race in his Gloucester hometown were moderately amusing but never really zinged, the occasional pleasing description notwithstanding. He needs to find more of a sense of purpose to properly hold an audience.

After the interval came a huge burst of energy from wild-haired Norwegian clown Viggo Venn, with a rambunctious blast of visual comedy segueing into some lively work with a sampling machine and Eminem’s My Name Is on loop. Venn invites the audience to insert their own names, then gleefully, but affectionately, mocks the way they do so while throwing himself around the stage. It’s simple idea, skilfully done with real zest, and earning Venn the other shared second place.

Host Jessica Fostekew knew she had to calm the mood after that, and skilfully reset the room for Chris Weir who has a different sort of odd energy with his socially detached camp. His set comprises tales from his job as a receptionist at a gay sauna, combining the mundane with the ick – but with the focus ver much on the latter. The material revelled too much in the gross for my taste, without much of a witty spin, and a lot of the audience seemed to fall into the same camp. But a notable minority went with it, so maybe it’s a case of finding his niche.

Sarah Roberts is peak millennial:  utterly self-absorbed, and treating everything with such irony she’s lost all sense of real feeling.  ‘Me, employed? As if? Can you even imagine!’ she starts with mock horror. An appealingly convincing character act - or at least exaggeration, you’d hope - she’s witheringly down on any other generation for not sharing her worldview. Material about being a ‘tragedy pervert’ was a little more contrived, but her entitled, scornful persona makes her very watchable, and secured her third (or technically fourth) place.

‘Let’s get this over with,’ is Jacob Nussey’s opening line, from which you can deduce the deadpan vibes he brings to the gig. Although you’d think he might be grateful to be here, given that his day job is working in an Amazon warehouse. He relays offbeat stories of this, of funerals, of peculiar racist encounters and of his native Mansfield all with an air of resigned indifference, which is highly effective.

Next, the third Will of the night, Hitt with an idiosyncratic obsession with former chess grandmaster Bobby Fischer. He tries to convince us his is  the celebrity breakdown we should all be talking about, and has plenty of good reasons why. Hitt could benefit with a few more solid jokes to back his attitude and interesting tidbits, and sometimes his delivery borrows a bit too much from Stewart Lee (a similarity his Birmingham accent underlines).But there’s certainly originality in the premise of his act.

Luke Nixon has an over-theatrical delivery that’s hard to connect with as he acts out the characters in his observational routines. It makes him feel too practised,  trying too hard to eke comedy out of unremarkable facts like being half-Scottish and half-English, or the clicking of fingers to show appreciation at poetry gigs. And I won’t forgive the 26-year-old for citing Frank Sinatra’s Fly Me To The Moon for the type of music middle-aged people grew up on. Mate, it was Nirvana, Pulp and The Smiths!

Finally Suzie Preece, who brought a lot of verve to the stage - just what is needed when you’re act No14. She’s naturally likeable with a cheery, engaging attitude that would make her a fine MC. Nostalgia for 1990s magazines and talk about being very self-aware could do with more punchlines to match the charm, but what lively company she is. A fine end to a fine night.

* An earlier version of this review confused Wills Hitt and Owen. Apologies.

Review date: 13 Dec 2022
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
Reviewed at: Leicester Square Theatre