Review of the latest new comedy final

Surely the only final anyone cared about yesterday was the Crack Comedy club’s inaugural new act competition.

And in Kingston, South-West London, the very promising Molly Mole took the title – and £250 prize – for her unfussy picture of life as a single mum on working-class estate with a brood so diverse it scares off potential stepfathers. Even the wokest of dates is deterred when their political correct theories come into contact with her reality, she says.

It’s a rich seam to mine, with Mole having so much to unpack in her life that she’ll have no shortage of material in the years to come. What she has at the moment could be comedically punchier, but – after taking to the stage in a cloud of vape smoke – she has a down-to-earth attitude that makes her an engaging presence, especially when she sticks to first-hand tales rather than more generic sexual content.

Second place went to Rik Goodman, a tetchy stoner type whose misanthropy seems like an affectation, but is effective nonetheless. A bitter man, he has no shortage of jaundiced jokes about what miserable childhood brought him to his place of abject grumpiness, but while he has an anti-comedy ethos, that doesn’t mean abandoning actual jokes.

Material about what a terrible name Barry is might be better left to Barry Ferns, who at least has a claim to be irritated by it, but Goodman’s a solid technician whose bleak worldview is appealing.

Opening the show, Eli Hart hit easy touchstones with gags about his appearances and a needlessly longwinded take on the ancient gag about a wife telling her husband: ‘Come upstairs and make love to me’ and getting the reply: ‘You’ll have to choose one or the other.’

He, too, is downbeat, slightly misanthropic – although the harshest scorn is always directed at himself – but his material isn’t yet as consistently good as the persona. A flourish of poeticism and a neatly flippant take on his social anxieties indicate what potential he has, however.

Christian Miles opens with a decent gag about setting himself challenges at work that’s stifled by his verbosity. But it sets the tone for a routine about his dead-end job that’s as relatable as his reminisces of being a performative punk in his 20s, trying to find a persona that fits.

Both parts of the set boast a decent punchline or two, but are wrapped in a lot of chit-chat that slows the pace, even for a five minute routine.

Naomi Townsend could offer him lessons in packing the jokes in, with a super-efficient set that offers one punchline after another. A few are a little pat or obvious – but the rate of them means there’s never a long wait for the next solid gag about her life. Amusing embittered snipes at the partner who cheated on her are the best, giving a glimpse of a darker undercurrent she could probably exploit more.

The delivery’s slightly wooden as she can’t hide the fact that such a tightly-packed routine is scripted. But her dedication to cramming the jokes in when so many new comics seem to just want to have a chat is admirable.

‘Long hair, short songs,’ is how Alex Prescott describes himself, and his ukulele strumming and improvised, cheeky lines about people in the audience go down well. But it feels gimmicky, a triumph of personality over material, as he’s essentially offering compere-y style crowd work, but set to a few simple chords.  And not very imaginative banter at that. 

Asking an international relations graduate ‘what’s your favourite international relation?’ and then teasing him for not being able to answer such a facile, meaningless question seems cheap.

Gaj San seemed relatively superficial too, with jokes that were solid but unexciting, and certainly lacking a distinctive angle. ‘Being from Sri Lanka’ is the closest we get to a personality trait, while his delivery was too rushed – nerves perhaps – and he came across as too needy to be liked.

Alvin Liu had the exact opposite approach, and his unconcealed contempt for Western snowflakes gave this Chinese comic a compelling attitude. To him – or at least his family – depression and ADHD are first-world problems suffered by delicate white princesses.  His gag-writing isn’t yet up there with that hilariously blunt scorn, but he’s one to watch.

We’ve all heard the ginger jokes, and Chris Cray probably more than most. But the bulk of his short routine is nonetheless dedicated to the topic even though any more than a couple of strong lines – which he has – to address the topic and defang potential hecklers is too much. He has an on-stage authority his slight poshness unfairly confers, but doesn’t do much with it, with largely pedestrian content on familiar themes.

There’s a touch of the David Seders about Lianna Holston, a wry, aloof American storyteller with an eloquence that draws you into her world. You can imagine her holding court at the Algonquin round table, long cigarette holder at he fingertips, as she details every indignity of falling down the stairs. A slow-burn approach that’s more about mood than killer payoffs isn't best suited to the five-minute format, but she made her mark on the show.

Social media sometimes lights up with threads such as ‘a movie quote you could also say during sex’, so it seems rather trite to be part of a stand-up set, as Billy James serves up here.

 Sex is on his brain, mind, as he amusingly shares a name with a porn star, even though the geeky-looking James (he waits far too long to do the obvious lookalike gag about is appearance) confesses to being no stud in the bedroom. His endless self-deprecation is just the right side of endearing, but in want of more substance to be truly impactful. 

Finally, Henning Nilsen leant into the stereotype of being an emotionless, dry Norwegian. Again, like the ginger and nerd comics before him, the putdowns directed against himself are as predictable as the dick jokes that followed. And his pause-filled deadpan did nothing to lift the mood. It’s all kinda fine, but the lack of ambition to do anything beyond the overfamiliar comedy norm is disappointing.

Review date: 15 Jul 2024
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
Reviewed at: The Grey Horse Kingston