Micky Flanagan
St George’s Hall

New material can be a blessing or a curse and Micky Flanagan's performance last night suffered from "tricky third album syndrome".
While his loveable punchy face works well on TV, sadly on stage it all comes down to sustained gag quality.
Comedy is best from the heart - which is why the rich seam of a tough Cockney childhood earned him deserved fame and riches.
But building a show around his new petit-bourgeois life means the soil is very thin.
Pronouncing "restaurant" as if it's a word previously alien to him did not ring true.
And that his "posher than him" wife from a non-swearing family took his son to a Mark Rothko exhibition only served to show his pride in new status.
Neither did his dull new life make for much originality or comedy.
He teasingly referred back to his wild youth, when crazy things happened, but then re-heated old staples about new domesticity. Think: "I'm not saying my wife's thick, nagging, can't cook, hogs the bed...etc."
He really wanted to use "Bird".
The problem was his new life just isn't as funny as the old one.
For example, missing a London bus needs a lot more imaginative work if it's to travel as a comedy vehicle.
Much material seemed underprepared and allowed to just trail off - even a brave beginning on a riff about the Twin Towers just crumbled..
And when he told how West Indian mates taught him to walk like a cool St Lucian by dragging a leg behind him, it served as an unhappy metaphor for the show.
A bit good, but also under-developed and even a bit limp.