Alongside his stand-up comedy career, Jeff Green is the writer of two successful comic books: The A-Z of Living Together and The A-Z of Being Single. His current touring show, From A-Z, also takes relationships as its subject. Fair enough, in theory -but much of this material is of the clapped-out kind from which comedy should have filed for divorce years ago. "It's not easy living with men, is it, ladies?" begins one depressing routine. Or "We like women don't we, fellas?" One hunkers down for an evening of consensual sexism - so it's a pleasant surprise when Green deviates from gender cliches into funnier comic territory.
Green's problem is he has no quality control. Some of his battle-of-the-sexes jokes use a Zimmer frame to get from stage to auditorium. Several routines, such as the one about the things women will never say ("I couldn't eat another chocolate"; "I've packed too much for the holiday"), simply rehash male-female stereotypes. Elsewhere, he labours to persuade us that the phrase "knob of butter" is funny. Green styles himself as an impish truth-teller, translating into honesty the tactful remarks we make to one another. But even these quips too often start from a chauvinist premise.
When he explores less hackneyed territory, though, Green's comic skills come into their own. Several amusingly exaggerated anecdotes about dates gone wrong reveal him as a vivid image-maker. Likewise his fantasy about rolling obese children to school: "Take the conker out of your pocket. You're fading to the left." And there are some surprisingly bright quips that flesh out his lovable good-for-nothing persona: "Wouldn't life be better," he asks, "if panicking worked?" If gigs were like dates, as Green claims, that line might have earned him another drink. Much more of his relationship shtick, though, and you'd give him a fake phone number and leave with a headache.
· At Theatr Gwynedd, Bangor, on Friday. Box office: 01248 351708. Then touring.
