REVIEW: Milton Jones: Lion Whisperer (Saturday 26th November)

St. George’s Hall, Bradford. Support: James Acaster

Going to see Milton Jones live would be a little bit of a punt for me. Most of the comedians I’ve seen on stage live and been happy to shell out twenty quid for have been comedians I’ve seen a lot on the telly or have got a DVD of, such as the excellent Tim Vine. Though I’d only seen a few appearances of Londoner Milton Jones on shows such as ‘Mock The Week’ I was pretty confident he had my sort of humour, specialising in the one-liners that the aforementioned Tim Vine has specialised in with the sort of pun-trading, surreal-scenario setting, loud-out-loud humour that I most enjoy. And I wasn’t to be disappointed.

It also didn’t do any harm that the gig was happening with a ten minute walk from my front door so off on Saturday night to St. George’s Hall I went, for a pleasant view of the stage from up on the grand tier, even if the seats weren’t exactly built for the build of a 21st Century male who hasn’t been to the gym in a few months, with immovable arm rests hemming you into the seats and so little leg room I would have preferred to wrap my calves around the gentleman in front of me and forgo the norms of society, than to be squeezed into the seat.

But, the minor issues of the seats wasn’t enough to put me off what was an enjoyable, and good value, night of comedy.

It was also one of the most unusual openings of a comedy show yet with two support acts.

The first opener was billed as Milton Jones’ granddad, walking onto the sparse stage with just a few par can lights and a projector screen, with a shopping trolley and a limp. It would be stating the obvious for me to mention who the act really was but it was a great twist on the opening of a gig, with twenty minutes of quick-fire puns and a great bit of schtick about starting the act again everytime a late-comer walked in that, maybe went on one-time too many, but had a great pay-off at the end and the joke used, with a reference to Bradford thrown in, was a classic.

With some use of props thrown in for good measure it was a great start to the show and, though only really a taster of what was to come, was a quality bit of comedy to whet the audience’s appetite, an audience that throughout the night flip-flopped between members of the audience who would happily shout out but not interact with Milton when he replied, or others that were just shouting off random bits at random moments, but to the comedians credit he dealt with them to great comic effect.

The real support was comedian James Acaster, a down-beat, self-effacing comedian whose considerable forty minute set-time seemed to start with jokes mostly about food but his subject matter was all great and his jokes very funny. Although his delivery was meant to be sombre it was well executed none-the-less, following on from Milton’s granddad routine, it didn’t have the energy needed to keep the night buzzing, so at about twenty-five minutes into the set it began to lose momentum and some interactions with the front row seemed to ignore the majority of the room and it lost its flow. However, James made up for it with a corking concluding visual demonstration on stage, using a willing participant who seemed to be more than happy to play along, filled with cracking visual jokes and witty lines. As the act took us up to the fifteen minute interval it wasn’t the most exciting of supports to get us in the mood, being quite laid back and slow in the delivery, but James Acaster was definitely one of the best support acts I’ve seen for his material and fitted Milton’s style well.

After the interval it was onto the main act and Milton’s set was as funny as I could hope for. Seventy minutes of perfectly delivered one-liners, his jokes were both surreal but very, very funny. He echoed back at times to both the support acts to milk jokes that you thought had run out of steam but were made funny once again, and his ten-minute skit on photo slides, with its surprise interlude, was the highlight of the night. As mentioned before Milton jostled well with the crowd who, though enjoying the night, weren’t that responsive to his banter and he also used trios of jokes, scattered throughout the show, to great effect, with the shampoo / shamrock / champagne triplet absolutely amazing.

With some nicely added in local place names scattered throughout his set, and a series of hilarious OHP slides and connected jokes delivered perfectly, the crowd was in hysterics for much of his set and, even though the punchline of the joke was obvious, others were much more surreal and others falsely leading you in the wrong direction.

Not many comedians could pull off a gig where the title just refers to a one-off joke near the start of his set, but although there was little narrative pulling the whole show together it stayed firmly on track and the huge range of jokes from everything from jokes on the United Nations to Dr Who to Wales, there was much to enjoy.

Milton threw in two quick encores with more fast-paced one-liners, bringing to the end of quality show of really funny jokes that mostly hit their marks, plus it was totally family friendly as well. It was just a shame the audience members that were so keen to shout up to be involved didn’t follow up their initial confidence.

Definitely one for a DVD purchase or a live gig if you can still get tickets for any!

9/10