The Stand

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Tue 16th Feb

 

When one is witnessing a performance from a comedian with as distinguished a record as David O’Doherty, one does not expect mediocrity. So despite the 2008 if.award winner opening his show on Tuesday night with a musical plea to ‘please please lower your expectations,’ the capacity crowd at The Stand were clearly expecting nothing less than the best.

 

Touring with his 2009 Edinburgh Fringe show David O’Doh Party, the affable Irishman stuck to the tried and tested formula which thus far has brought him critical acclaim and the Fringe’s top award, and judging by the audience’s raucous reaction on Tuesday, such an approach is likely to continue drawing in new fans.

The ins and outs of a mundane existence were a central theme throughout O’Doherty’s set, which intertwined both a utilization of the comedian’s natural storytelling ability and songs on his now famous plastic keyboard. Topics covered included his having ‘very mild superpowers’, and the heart-wrenching guilt which accompanied meeting a woman who O’Doherty had spent his childhood years ogling through a telescope, and many more which can only be described through the medium of the grunts and groans which populate most of the comic’s jokes. I say ‘jokes’ in the loosest possible sense of course, and O’Doherty is inclined to agree, stating from the outset that ‘I’ve never written a joke in my life’.

Absence of ‘jokes’ aside, O’Doherty continues to delight audiences worldwide with his manchild approach to life and ability to make you smile – whether cheerfully, sadistically or shamefully – no matter the situation being described. A notable illustration of this admirable trait came during a heart-warming description of the time O’Doherty wrote a song for a friend who was suffering depression, which he deemed a success, due to the fact that ‘she hasn’t topped herself yet...hurray!’ It is the upfront and honest nature of O’Doherty’s perennial jolly comedy which keeps us coming back for more, regardless of any of the comedian’s self criticism and accusations of mediocrity.

Although the deliberate self criticism may remain, any mediocrity of material and approach (if indeed there ever was any) is nowhere to be seen. O’Doherty has clearly found his niche, and it is one which he is willing to share with all those who will have him, and of those there are many.

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