Jason Manford, Arena Birmingham – review
The tickets seemed to be suggesting that Jason Manford was going to keep us going for around two-and-a-half hours on this cooler, damp evening much unlike anything we have experienced recently.
So perhaps the biggest compliment we can pay him is that he kept us with him. With a 25-minute interval slotted in to top up drinks and empty bladders.
Some people shifted weight between buttcheeks towards the end but other than that this Salford funnyman had people largely eating out of his hand.
Tonight we discussed family and societal class structures. Jason was very much a working class product. He knew council estates, he knew hand-me-down clothes and he knew manual work.
So after his success on the stage and television (and heftier wallet) he is somewhat bemused by his children’s love of hummus and iPads.
He refers to this weird stasis in between two functioning sections of society (working and middle class) as the Muddle Class – the title of his latest creation.
The pre-interval segment geared this up. He introduced us to his children and career as a comedian.
From the highs of selling out stadiums to the lows of crashing and burning at a Professional Footballers’ Association dinner because he abused former Manchester United and City striker Carlos Tevez, we learnt how being famous has changed his children’s upbringing and how his own childhood self is in constant battle in his mind with wanting, as a parent, for your child to have everything it needs.
And when he returned we continued to put the world to rights. Like how when you think about it the majority of Disney films for kids are completely messed up and how this has made his children care little about the prospect of he and his wife dying.
And all throughout was the constant family battle. Kids wanting different things to him while his blue-collar-and-proud plumber brother picks them up on every stuffy detail he can while screaming ‘YOU'VE CHANGED’.
It was smooth and fast-paced and there was certainly nothing muddled about his delivery. With 20 years of stand-up under his belt it is great to see Jason still able to get at the heart of what his audience may be feeling and pull them along with him.
Even with 21 st century pirates appearing everywhere.
