At the end of his new touring show, Chris Addison takes questions from the crowd. It is no more or less funny than the preceding 100 minutes. Is that a problem? Yes and no. No, if you're content with standup that's bouncy, insubstantial and concerned with the everyday stuff you'd discuss at the pub. Yes, if you recall how Addison once made a virtue of his esoteric interests, and at least tried to take comedy to new places.
Now, courtesy of The Thick of It, Addison is a celebrity, and doesn't have to try so hard. Tonight, he reanimates that comedy cadaver, the trip to the gym, and talks unconvincingly about what a geek he was at school. In the livelier second half, he reviews the sex tips for married people in one of his wife's magazines, and reveals his problems with tolerance – especially of Ugg boots and anti-speed camera protestors. (Them: "Is this the kind of England you want to live in?" Addison, incensed: "YES!")
Addison casts himself as exaggeratedly middle class – which is appealing enough, until he starts simplistically dismissing BNP voters as lumpen meatheads. When his stories stray towards significance, he steers them clear with a glib quip. He is funniest when raging at Wi-Fi connections or the supposed security provided by that three-digit number on the back of credit cards. But the passion seems skin-deep. One waits in vain for him to really get into the thick of it.
