The people of Brighton must have Britain's smallest bladders. Either that, or the Gardner Centre's bar staff have put something in the beer. For most of Tommy Tiernan's show, someone is either walking across the front of the stalls in a can't-stop-or-I'm-gonna-wet-myself sort of way, then banging out through the swing doors, or making the return trip in that apologetic half-crouch perfected by fidgety cinema-goers.
Add in the usual idiots too idle to turn off their mobile phones, and you understand why so many stand-up comedians seek the more controllable world of television. Tiernan himself has parlayed his 1998 Perrier award into a string of TV jobs, including compere of BBC1's The Stand-Up Show and a lead role in Channel 4's limp sitcom Small Potatoes.
To Tiernan's credit, he does not let the interruptions rattle him. Instead he works his old shtick as the sweet-natured, self-deprecating Irish slacker, meditating on death, fatherhood, the screwed-upness of his compatriots and his alleged status as a "massive sex god". (He is, it's true, far less pasty-faced than he once was.) He doesn't rely on quick wit alone: more thoughtful than many comics, he has even talked seriously of standing for the Irish parliament.
At its best this show confirms how good traditional stand-up can be. At its worst ... well, there are a handful of crass, poorly thought-through jokes about the Paralympics and mental illness that should have been tied up in a sack and thrown off Beachy Head.
Overall, the evening never quite coheres. Tiernan tries in vain to Polyfilla the cracks between the longer routines with musings such as: "Are you familiar with the phrase, 'The mind boggles'? Does anything else boggle?" He looks tired, and the way he repeatedly calls Brighton Bristol suggests that touring is taking its toll. But the crowd love it, and if only 60 of the 90 minutes are inspiring, that's 45 more than many of his peers could manage.
At the Gordon Craig Theatre, Stevenage (08700 131 030), tonight, the Corn Exchange, Cambridge (01223 357851), tomorrow, then touring.
