Names are very important...

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We Are Not Amused 2012
Live Review
Royal Albert Hall

There were moments in the first half of the Prince’s Trust star-studded We Are Most Amused fundraiser where simply watching the performance seemed like an act of charity, with a series of ill-judged ideas casting a pall over the night that the real stand-ups had to battle to overturn.

Compere Ben Elton was one such mood-killer. He’s a patron of the charity and tonight’s creative director – and treated us to the coup of a Blackadder comeback sketch to close the night. But for all the brilliant work he put into the night, he’s no stand-up any more, and his opening monologue came within a whisker of dying completely, with long rants playing to silence.

Just moaning about Starbucks calling their small coffees ‘tall’ or whining about being put on hold doesn’t really cut it, and sound more like the grumblings of an out-of-touch old man – however structurally sound the routines, or how much incredulous emphasis he puts into delivering his complaints. Occasionally a well-drawn image would break the dreariness – such as his descriptions of the massive popcorn and drinks containers sold in cinemas – but he set the bar low.

Opening act Stephen K Amos would surely have been a better host. He might not be as famous as Elton, but he’s got a friendliness people warm to, and a few cracking lines – even if the best, about him being one of twins, comes courtesy of his blunt-speaking mother. Amos is no stranger to performing to royals, of course, and when he played this very benefit in 2008, Prince Harry infamously told him afterwards: ‘You don't sound like a black chap.’ Perhaps wisely, that story didn’t make his routine tonight – although an even more racist comment from an Adelaide radio DJ did.

Next up a truly dismal sketch, in which Sanjeev Bhaskar and Helen Lederer played a wine-chugging middle-class couple feigning concern for the education system while really being self-serving and callous. The premise might have been OK, but the script was laugh-free – so imagine the audience’s indifference when it turned out this would be a recurring scenario over the night. By the third time they reappeared, the disappointment was actually audible.

Another misfire quickly followed, with Jon Culshaw appearing as Simon Cowell and ‘singing’ what allegedly could have been his X Factor song – just a list of words associated with him, like ‘high trousers’ and ‘Sinitta’ listed in the style of Billy Joel’s We Didn’t Start The Fire. Sorry, Jon, you shouldn’t go through to the next round.

Bhaskar returned for a brief, inconsequential linking slot when he imagined the Royal Albert Hall as an intimate Indian wedding venue, then it was left to Patrick Kielty to try to get the audience properly laughing again. He had something of a fight on his hand, from such a cold start, and after a hit-and-miss routine discovered that the harsh jokes were what the crowd wanted, regardless of whether they were really the sort of gags you should be telling in front of Charles and Camilla.

But if Kielty was rude, it was a mere hors d’oeuvre for the unashamedly vulgar Joan Rivers, in true bilious mood, bitching about how old people depress her and how she hates handicapped people – a feeling born from having to look after one. Shocked laughs came from her discussing her 79-year-old vagina... and even her unreconstructed racist material about all Mexicans being ugly and the Chinese eating dogs, even though it’s not to be encouraged. Still, the passion of her performance filled the space like no one else could.

Culshaw partially redeemed himself in his second appearance of the night, showing his considerable talents for mimicry of various characters... which makes you wonder why he insists on having each of them say their name rather than allowing the audience to figure it out for themselves. Material-wise, his jokes about George Bush’s linguistic atrocities are well beyond their tell-by date, but his brisk and entertaining round-up of some telly comedians could save you a fortune on DVDs this Christmas.

He came back after the interval as Boris Johnson, for no good reason, to introduce comedy band The Midnight Beast, for the kids. At the risk of sounding like a fuddy-duddy, though, a combination of poor acoustics and poor diction made it very difficult to discern any of their lyrics - which is something of a drawback if that’s where the jokes lie. Still, the music of Medium Pimpin' and Just Another Boyband got the section off to an energetic start.

After Elton returned, Milton Jones took to the stage with his deliciously eccentric one-liners, most of which took a second or two for the penny to drop. Skilful writing, including an imaginative callback to someone else’s earlier material, made him one of the strongest acts on the bill – and kicked off a run of stand-ups who knew what they were doing.

Omid Djalili went down well, too, with his silly mix of ethnic piss-taking and Godzilla impressions, and showed a flash of treasonable insubordination with a very funny line about the work the Prince’s Trust does. There’s a bit too heavy a reliance on funny accents in some of his older material that got an airing tonight, but in the style of a slightly old-fashioned entertainer, entertain is what he did.

Observational Ed Byrne kicked off with some cliched material about airline travel - the dumb questions at check-in, the confiscation of tweezers as if you could bring a jet down with grooming products etc – before moving on to more distinctive, and funnier, observations on the same subject, which turned out to need at least a bit of that earlier, hackier stuff to work. And he has the best ‘bathroom scales’ routine in the business.

Almost finally, Jimmy Carr doing something good for Britain’s underprivileged. No, not pay his taxes - but deliver for charity his usual stream of slick one-liners, starting with the silly and moving into increasingly dark territory about shagging around and non-consensual sex. But it’s not about morals, it’s about wordplay – at which he is a master engineer.

Then came that Blackadder sketch – which started rather clunkily (and even managed a ‘what about her knockers?’ joke which would have been dated by the end of Seventies) despite Miranda Hart's best efforts. But it burst into life when Rowan Atkinson made his surprise appearance, proving his comic genius at infusing every line with wit that even the writer might not have seen. The script got sharper and more satirical too, andTony Robinson’s Baldrick completing the double-act made the scene even more special... giving punters who paid up to £125 a ticket something memorable for their money.

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Omid's back on tour, hoorah! He's in a class of his own, been making me laugh and think for years now. Lovely bloke and lovely material.

Michael Monkhouse, March 2013

I have seen his stuff on the tv and thought that he is definitely one of the greatest comedians of our time, though i have not seen him live, it is my hope that i may do so in the near future.

Matthew Sharp, August 2010

My last comment I was still on a rush from his Montreal appearance! Since then my passion's dwindled somewhat. Omid has some superb lines, it's just a shame he repeats them in a way that'd make Jack Dee blush. And his telly stuff's quite up to standard, but as Jo Brand demonstrated sketches ain't always the forté of the stand-up, even though they fill up the show... Still a class act though.

Michael Monkhouse, July 2008

Adore this guy. Fast, funny, witty... One minute he's prancing around, the next he's making intelligent comments on important political issues. Brilliant stuff.

Michael Monkhouse, January 2008

Recently attended a recording of Omid's new show and was left rather unimpressed. I fail to see why Mister Djalili was so keen for his own BBC show when he appears to be using it solely as a platform for stand-up material which he's already aired several times on the same channel. The sketches were often self-indulgent and repetitive, and almost all the material was stuff he's been using for years now. You could tell he didn't enjoy the recording, and he told us, straight facedly, we'd been a crap audience - which left a bad taste. Saw Omid live last year and loved him, but can't say as I'm looking forward to the series.

Charles Thomson, August 2007

Don't knock what you can't beat. Omid is not only a lovely guy, but an ever-growing and recognised talent. His live comedy is awesome. Watch him when he improvises. Truly a master. Next year's plans are exciting. He is always drawn back to his first love, stand-up, but his talent means that now everyone wants a piece of him. And why box in a genius?

A Friend, August 2006

Was at Omid's TV recording at the BBC the other night and though the sketch and stand up genre is beneath him he breathed new life into it in a way that the likes of Ben Elton and Lenny Henry killed it. Let's hope the BBC give him a series so we can be saved from the useless fare they have at the moment.

James Douglas, June 2006

Exceptionally funny and moving. This show is an attitude changer - wow.

Caron, March 2006

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