Watching Russell Kane on stage is like setting light to a box of fireworks: you get a constant stream of explosions, you never quite know where they’ll end up, but you can’t help getting excited watching the bangs.
From the moment he started his hour-plus set Kane delivered a frenetic combination of gags, anecdotes and unexplainable wild tangents that ranged from arthouse cinema to anal gases, riffing off the audience much more than relying on a rehearsed routine. I can’t even be sure there was a routine.
His humour covers some typical topics – romance and relationships, and especially his family (a rich mine so far, but in danger of being overplundered) – but it also weaves in more introspective commentary on his life as a comedian. It’s almost Stewart Lee on ecstasy and in improbably skinny jeans.
Kane’s winning run on Let’s Dance for Comic Relief was almost certainly a factor in him securing a four-night sell out run at the Playhouse, but it was his inventive and intelligent and idiotic comedy that left several audience members crying with laughter.
