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From his Comedy Roadhshow

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The son of comedy scriptwriter Ray Cameron - who co-wrote Kenny Everett's TV shows with Barry Cryer, Michael McIntyre's first stand-up success came at the 2003 Edinburgh Festival, where he was nominated for the Perrier best newcomer award. He returned to the festival in 2004, 2006 and 2007.

In 2006, he made his debut at the Kilkenny comedy festival, returning the following year when he also added Montreal's Just For Laughs festival to his CV. In 2007 he was nominated for the Chortle Award for best headliner – a title he won in 2008.

He is a regular face on panel shows and on stand-up shows on both TV and radio, including the Comedy Store and The World Stands Up on Paramount and 4 Stands Up on Radio 4 in 2007/8, which he hosted.

Michael McIntyre: Showtime
Live Review
O2 Arena

The material is moulded by state-of-the-art robotics; precision engineering ensuring that nothing is out of place. It’s the video introduction to Michael McIntyre’s new arena tour, a fantasy montage showing his sharp suit being clamped into place by cybernetic technology, but the metaphor for his perfectly-honed stand-up is irresistible.

The intricate care that lies behind the routines he delivers with his familiar super-confident breeziness make for an almost bulletproof show. McIntyre may have his detractors for his lack of edge – just about every wet-behind-the-ears new act with ten minutes’ stage time under their belt seems to have a snide word for him – but Showtime has, unquestionably, some of the funniest routines you’ll hear this year.

Yet erring on the side of safety means there are also a good chunk of observations and ideas which don’t seem particularly fresh, so holding him back from achieving a beginning-to-end brilliance, despite the virtuosity of his finest material.

For instance, he starts with the Olympics, which provide the opportunity to repeatedly use a triumphant ‘Team GB!’ cry as a feelgood oratorial device as well as provoking workaday comments dressage being for ‘gay horses’. And on the Jubilee, thoughts about the octogenarian Queen being forced to stand in the rain for the river pageant, or Prince Philip feigning an illness to get our of any more ‘celebrations’ seemed common at the time, let alone months later.

It’s not the observations that gets the laughs, but McIntyre acting out the moves, whether it be Grace Jones’s hula-hooping or those camp horses. The Games, especially, gives him free rein to scarper around the stage like an excited child, even though his trademark skipping seems to be largely curtailed in this show. Perhaps it was the source of just one too many jibes at his expense…

For a man known for his quotidian material, there’s a touch more surrealism than normal too. The Queen indulging in unlikely activities is no great jump, but his routine about names with alternative spellings – like Steven or Stephen – becomes a symphony of odd noises, made hilarious though repetition and slight variation.

It’s a technique he uses to devastating effect several times in the show, and never more in the superlative closing segment about a trip to the dentist gone wrong. This brilliant routine is worth the ticket price alone, with its graphic, often slapstick, imagery. With his mouth numbed by anaesthetic he can’t make himself understood in a nightmarish series of health indignities he can’t fully grasp. It’s almost Carry On Kafka.

Making himself the brunt of some of his routines plays well, especially to the female half of audience, thanks to great routines about how what an idiot he is which apply, by extension, to all men. His catalogue of domestic niggles about tidying the laundry or the dirty dishes will certainly resonate through relationships everywhere – and wittily described.

His family life is well-mined; from the indignity his wife suffers in putting on a pair of tights, to some fun stories about entertaining his two children: Lucas, seven, and Oscar, five. The personal touch helps McIntyre stay the right side of the line between sharing universal experiences and becoming mundane. Fine flourishes in writing – for example in the otherwise familiar niggles of undertaking an online purchase – further help elevate the night.

To complain about Michael McIntyre not being cutting edge is to complain about Stewart Lee not doing musical parodies; it’s just not what he does. But in broad-appeal arena-filling stand-up, he remains the king – and Showtime only cements that position.

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He really is a cheesy, irritating, jumped-up 'look at me'

donal mckintyre, August 2008

This guy is currently my favourite comedian. So what if observational comedy is very '80s? It works, and Mr McIntyre is a master of it.

Jackie Craig, June 2008

Brilliant comic, saw him last night and loved it, his show ended up lasting about 2 and a half hours after the encore. He was brilliant on the spot with comments made by the crowd and jokes seemed to pop into his head whilst he was on stage. I really like the fact he says what he is thinking as well if he gets thrown off or loses track of where he is going with a joke, he makes a joke out of it! Very, very funny, man and seems incredibly likeable too.

Corylus, February 2008

My wife and I saw Michael at a packed out Tivoli Theatre in Wimborne last night. What a brilliant evening! His style of delivery and observational comedy is Izzard-esque but without the makeup and high heels. He cleverly engaged with the audience throughout. He's quick-witted, charming and very funny. Catch him if you can on his current tour. You won't be disappointed.

Richard Neal, February 2008

Saw Michael last night at the City Varieties in Leeds. He was wonderful. The show was over too soon. I could have watched him for hours.

Sarah, February 2008

This is my favourite comedian by far. The way he speaks, walks and the way he puts a comedic spin on things we do in everyday life is hilarious, not to mention the most probably fictional stories he tells... He is one of the few good comedians who can talk properly, and do an act without taking on a character plus do visual humour with verbal humour to go with it, that 's actually funny...

Zachary Decent, February 2008

Just saying things enthusiastically doesn't make them funny! I've seen him twice now and just find him irritating. His writing is incredibly lazy and he certainly doesn't deserve the status he has inexplicably attained.

Andy, January 2008

My husband and I watched Michael on telly at The Apollo and we laughed so much we couldn't breathe. Amazing

Kim and Bern Gardiner, January 2008

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