Somewhere in an alternate universe, Ross Noble embarks on his UK tour this month – another evening of noodly, off-the-cuff comedy, no doubt, to delight audiences (in person!). In this reality, he’s launched Lockdown Lounge instead: an interactive live webcast from a supposed bunker in his own home. You can tune in daily at 11am, double-take when Noble hails you with a “good evening” (he lives just south of Melbourne, Australia) – then knuckle down and get involved in the show.
It’s an offering with no pretensions whatsoever: half an hour of often poorly filmed, out-of-sync nonsense in which Noble invites quarantined viewers to play games, perform stunts and supply surprising content – a term that just about covers Sunday’s live colonic irrigation sequence.
Noble MCs from a seat at his webcam, which he shares with Baby Sting, his daughter’s dolly, which is wearing a DIY mask of the Police’s lead singer. “This man clearly has too much time on his hands,” writes one contributor (comments are visible on-screen), to which Noble responds: “That’s precisely the point!” Right now, we all do – and creating inspired silliness is a good way of spending it.
There’s plenty of that here. Recurring features include pet Buckaroo, which involves stacking socks on dogs’ backs, and visits to the sword-wielding Lord Tim and a couple who act out groansome puns for Ross to fathom. “Vic and Bob,” writes another commenter, “would love this.” And they probably would.
Lockdown Lounge isn’t a particularly good vehicle for what Noble is best at – extemporised flights of comic fancy – although he seldom wants for a deft quip. On connecting to a family in Leicester and seeing only “two angelic children” on screen, he says: “I thought I’d been put through to the Overlook Hotel.” What it has going for it is cheerful egalitarianism (Noble considers his audience-performers every bit as deserving of screen time as he is) and a spirit of idiotic fun. It’s shambolic, lo-fi and buffering – but there’s a spark of indelible silliness to Noble’s livestream, and a sense of community among the host and his stooges, that amply compensate.
Ross Noble’s Lockdown Lounge is on Instagram daily at 11am (UK time).
