Stewart Lee has attained guru status on the stand-up scene. He's supremely at ease on stage, and his ribbing of lazier peers ("Do you remember Spangles? Do you? Do you?") draws attention to the comedy class divide. In his new set, there are several inspired riffs. But Lee's technical excellence is driving him in directions I sometimes find easier to admire than enjoy.
It's about timing. On one hand, Lee's opening routine is brilliant: an extended piece about how, after 9/11, he salved the world's wounds with farting. But he tells it slowly, wilfully testing the audience's patience. Likewise later, with an interminable riff about the director Ang Lee's name. I appreciated his technical control, while longing for the joke to end.
Sometimes, his audience-baiting is more subtle - and the better for it. Claiming to be "Scotch" himself, he proves William Wallace was gay and that Scotland "was invented in 1905 by McGowan sweet company as a way of marketing Highland toffee". His best material is his most animated - particularly, an extrapolation of Jimmy Hill's claim that the words "chinny" and "nigger" are equally offensive. There are brilliant pay-offs but he makes you work for them.
· Until August 29. Box office: 0870 745 3083.
