Stephen Grant: Life\'s Too Short

Note: This review is from 2006

Review by Steve Bennett

A pedant he may be but it's Grant's keen sense of the particular that make his gags so well crafted and precisely written. And this show is just that, packed with gag after gag it's a wonder he manages to squeeze them all into just an hour.

Having reached the fourth year of his fourth decade Grant has decided that life is too short for the pedantry that almost rules his life. He realised this, he tells, following an incident in his local Italian restaurant when he entered into an argument with the waiter over the imperial/metric sizing of pizzas.

On finding fellow pedants in the crowd ­ one nominated by her helpful boyfriend ­ he warns of the crack cocaine equivalent for fellow pedants, the point where you know when you've gone too far ­ when you start correcting graffiti.

Elsewhere he gets a little serious, tapping in to a realisation surely familiar to everyone who's turned 30, that life is too short and that you haven't got all the time in the world as every twentysomething seems to think. He moves on to ponders those things that might kill you prematurely - smoking, being hit by a bus and obesity suggesting that bakers will become the new bartenders: 'No more buns for you sir I think you've had enough.'

On finally deciding that you really can't live any longer or achieve mortality, Grant instead decides that posterity is the way to go. His great-great-grandfather had some inventions patented, though none have seen the light of day. Nevertheless Grant has a handful of rather quaint but potentially profitable ones of his own - some of which are surprisingly good ideas.

This is a logically sound, grammatically correct and very funny piece of work, one a prize pedant such as Grant could be truly proud of.

Reviewed by: Marissa Burgess

Review date: 1 Aug 2006
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett

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