Alex Horne: Monsieur Butterfly, On tour
Much like his Cambridge contemporary and occasional collaborator Mark Watson, Alex Horne is a comedian of vaulting, almost absurd ambitions. Not the single-minded pursuit of fame and fortune, but instead a willingness to do the most outrageously demanding things in the name of entertainment. Previous shows have seen him engaging in competitive birdwatching (he tried to spot more birds than his veteran birdwatcher father in the space of a year) and attempting to get a word of his own devising into the Oxford English Dictionary. This show sees Horne setting himself another challenge: over the course of the evening, he’ll construct onstage an elaborate Heath Robinson machine. Watching a man build something may not sound like great entertainment, but the absurd pleasure Horne takes in his endeavour – and the lightly cerebral, thoroughly daffy tales he chucks in along the way – make this a delight.
Shappi Khorsandi: Because I’m Shappi, On tour
Tehran-born Khorsandi is a confessional comic, if not a chronic over-sharer. The concept of “too much information” is not one that applies to her live shows, as she lays bare the details of her frequently disastrous personal history. This isn’t simply an exercise in score-settling with her exes (although there is plenty of that), it’s also an opportunity for Khorsandi to repeatedly and entertainingly humiliate herself in front of a paying audience. Because I’m Shappi is a more upbeat evening than some of her previous efforts, concerned mainly with family matters – she’s recently become a mother for the second time, and she covers this as well as her richly comic relationship with her exiled Iranian dissident father. She’s certainly an ebulliently likable presence onstage, which – judging by some of the details she relates – may be the only place where she can get away from her tumultuous life.
Jack Dee’s Helpdesk, On tour
Jack Dee has an unusual status in British comedy. Yes, he spends a fair amount of time operating at the cosier end of the spectrum, thanks to his chairmanship of Radio 4’s I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue. But he’s also venerated by many of the new generation of comics. Nick Helm and Seann Walsh both cite him as one of the guys that made them want to be comedians, while Dee is also shortly to be starring alongside Josh Widdicombe in the latter’s keenly awaited BBC sitcom. In everything he does, he maintains the same quality of grumpy detachment that’s always been key to his persona. This show uses the same Helpdesk format that he recently tried on TV. It sees him taking on the role of an agony aunt, with the audience invited to submit problems for him to solve or more likely deconstruct and ridicule.
