Catherine Bennett resumes the weekly look at the performing arts world, with the sad end of Jerusalem, the luck of a cabbie, and French revolt. Do you hear the people sing?
Adam Alcock reviews Nigel Kennedy playing Vivaldi's Four Seasons and his own Four Elements at York Opera House.
Catherine Bennett highlights the trends in the performing arts world today.
Jonathan Cridford reviews 'Ghosts', one of the Freshers' plays for this year.
Spare a thought for the six thousand men who were dragged along by their other halves to watch two hours of the comic ‘chatty man’s’ camp repertoire of embarrassing day-to-day ramblings. Actually, scratch that - as proved by his long-awaited ‘Spexy Beast’ stand-up show, Alan Carr is a guilty pleasure which can be enjoyed by women who love self-belittling chat show hosts and their boyfriends alike.
Four years after the success of Tooth Fairy, Carr has come a long way with his observational comedy. In true diva-esque style, Alan arrives onstage a fashionable ten minutes late, with a few warnings: ‘My show’s like Cher Lloyd. Some bits are nice, you think aaaaaww that’s good innit, and then I start cracking out all the crap stuff.’ We then proceed to watch him cavort about the stage attempting to imitate some form of gangster rap with an uncanny likeness. But after the dancing and prancing, Alan gets down to the good stuff: the jokes.
A far cry from the bitchy, cynical undertones of Tooth Fairy, this time round Alan appears to have taken the oh-so-camp approach to his comedy, replete with the bouncing-off-the-walls energy of a five year old. Alan treats us to two hours of, amongst other things, cringe-worthy anecdotes accompanied by an awkward bite of the lip and a shriek of ‘Oooh that’s bad though innit Sheffield!’ Quite right, when the story preceding it involves a woman taking a missing person’s poster to the hairdressers. Equally he introduces us to some new phenomena we’ve never heard come across. ‘I’ve got mincer’s leg. It’s serious Sheffield! My hips have been worn down by years of walking like this!’ Alan keeps the gay theme fresh when he tells us of his encounters with Gok Wan, who he assures us he simply cannot marry and have kids with, due to the fact they’d be ‘Wan-Carrs.’
An hour in and several buckets of sweat later, one couldn’t help wondering if Alan had strayed away from bitching at society so much due simply to the fact that the past four years had given way to a bigger belly and a smaller head of hair. (Now who’s being bitchy?) However, true to any well-established comic, Alan can’t resist having a poke at the audience. ‘What’s that madam? You sound very high up…you watch you don’t fall onto this woman’s teeth, you’ll be impaled!’ However, no Alan Carr gig would be complete without several self-deprecating digs. Alan takes no pleasure in reminding us numerous times that he is a raging alcoholic, making references to the ‘red-wine-lips’ after a cheeky few at lunch time, as well as comforting us that we all answer the phone in the morning hungover and convince the listener we’ve been up for hours. ‘Just had an orange juice…done two hours of Pilates’ he groans, like Hilary Devey after a breakfast of forty Marlboro Gold and a bucket of razor blades.
There was a degree of sympathy to be had for Alan, however, as he told us of some of the antics of his slightly lacking-in-sanity fans. ‘When people come up to me and shout, “I love you!” that’s fine, I can take that. But when they shout “Alan!” and then hide in a bush so I can’t see them… That’s weird… That’s weird innit.’ Or, even better, ‘ “Can I try your glasses on?” No, you can’t try my glasses on! They’re not a gimmick… I need these to see! You wouldn’t go up to Steven Hawking and say, “Budge over love, let’s have a go!” would ya!?’
You have to wonder if Alan lives the showbiz lifestyle of any other well-known celebrity or if in fact, like the geeky spectacle-wearing child at school, he is bullied on a day-to-day basis. As Alan recounts his years riding a bike to the Radio 2 studios in London, he recalls, ‘People have this thing in London where if you’re riding a bike, they try to KILL YOU.’ With only a bell to defend himself, he barks at the audience, ‘You may have an 18-wheeler but can you deal with tinnitus!?’
Though a far cry from Tooth Fairy in terms of content, Carr reminds us why it’s worth waiting four years for his stand-up tour, as his comic style and stage presence are nothing short of hilarious. Although not completely faultless, Carr’s Spexy Beast was two hours of achingly true-to-life comic genius, which comforted us that we all suffer from time to time at the hands of a bottle of wine and modern technology. And will inevitably suffer from sweaty man-boobs.
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