Review: Stephen Merchant at Wolverhampton Civic Hall

Stephen Merchant

Wolverhampton Civic Hall

Review by Ian Harvey

Freed from his small screen duties alongside Ricky Gervais in The Office, Extras and the forthcoming Life's Too Short, Stephen Merchant arrived in Wolverhampton on his first ever stand-up comedy tour . . . in search of a wife.

"It's not going very well," he confessed of his 'Hello Ladies' tour, "because if it was I wouldn't be in Wolverhampton, would I?"

Mind you, support act Josh Widdicombe had already established that most of the audience were not from Wolverhampton, or if they were they wished they weren't.

Merchant explained he'd assumed fame, money and the odd Golden Globe would have been enough to have a queue forming at his door but that hadn't been the case and he remained resolutely single.

Whether his performance was enough to woo any Wolverhampton singletons into matrimony remains to be seen but if you can laugh a lady into love then it might just be possible, as he charmed the audience, male and female, with his hilarious take on life and loving.

From the tribulations of playing the dating game when you're 6' 7" to the inadequacies of text speak, an alternative Last Supper and the perils of watching porn on VHS tapes, Merchant kept the laughter coming with his easy going manner and soft, Bristolian burr.

And no-one in the audience at the Civic on Saturday night will ever look at the staff in the city's Asda store in quite the same light again after he coaxed a tale of love, loss and betrayal out of one couple on the front row. Who'd have thought it? What a soap opera!

Merchant is due to return to the Civic for a second show on Saturday, November 26, unless, presumably, he finds a wife before then.

Sorry Stephen, but let's just hope you don't.