Miles Jupp: An amusing classist’s show marred by leary seating.
When I saw Miles Jupp perform at First Laughs I feared that his ten-minute set based on the British class system and his place near its top would prove too exhaustingly foreign for a Kiwi audience to handle for an entire hour. So, when he opened the show with that same set I sweated beads of comic worry. To my surprise, it worked. The introductory lecture of classism gives us enough comprehension to understand his mindset as someone who cannot connect with the common man, which was key to the evening’s tales.
When cracking jokes, Jupp is superb; erudite, charming and scathing. His crisp ranting is reminiscent of Ben “Yahtzee” Croshaw (Zero Punctuation) with Graham Chapman’s unflappability dabbed in. His ability to craft tags (the punchlines that happen after a punchline) is top notch, as is his ability to shoehorn local references to his bits seamlessly, something that speaks to his craftsmanship as a comic. Considering his other anecdotes, including a beautifully told tale of a teen hood testicular torsion, were so good I was surprised that the only disappointment to be had was in his last anecdote about a night bus to Amsterdam. The story plodded, and ultimately didn’t have direction. The way it fizzled out so, worrying for what was otherwise a pleasant evening.
If you wish Stephen Fry was slightly more cruel and swore a tad more often, then go to Jupp. I enjoyed him.
At San Francisco Bath House, 26 April – 1 May, 7pm
