Stewart Lee, Romesh Ranganathan (rapping), Sami Abu Wardeh - Mark Muldoon's Comedy Diary
Published: Sunday 18th December 2022
In 2018, The Times named Stewart Lee "the best living comedian", a claim Lee has been happy to use in his publicity materials ever since. The rest of the top five is interesting to look back on - whilst Harry Hill and Tim Key continue to be excellent, Hannah Gadsby and Dave Chappelle could probably be described as no longer hitting the same levels of acclaim they were achieving four years ago.
If you're inclined to consider such questions, it could lead you to ask: into which of these two broad camps does Stewart Lee now fall?
He's nearing the end of a three-month residency at London's Leicester Square Theatre, for his new tour show 'Basic Lee'. It's billed as 'back to basics' stand-up. If that makes committed fans worry the show might be a little more carelessly thrown together than usual, it perhaps won't have allayed their fears to learn that Lee's performance isn't 100% new material, but instead lightly peppered with occasional reboots of old routines.
That still leaves a lot of fresh ground to cover elsewhere in the show, however. The first half is more straightforward - "Mock The Week-type shit", as Lee disparagingly calls it. His suggestion is that the true comedy connoisseur should prefer what comes in the second half, as Lee undertakes his now-traditional toying with the form of stand-up, as the show's structural elements gradually reveal themselves, and as jokes get drawn out so they last minutes - Lee audaciously repeating elements until they eventually become funny again.
Without wanting to sound like the kind of uncultured airhead that finds Mock The Week funny, what's before the interval is better. The second half's structures aren't as blazingly ingenious as Lee makes them out to be, the longer routines are slightly flimsy premises on which to base lengthy sections, and his usual drawing out of jokes has started to feel tired, rather than innovative, as it did in 2006.
As Lee has continued to get more popular, the fact that he still tries to portray himself - to some extent - as a struggling comedian continues to lose credibility. A "millionaire underdog", as John Robins economically referred to him way back in 2015. The aforementioned committed fanbase, it should be stated, appear to be having a fantastic night out. For my money, there's about 50 minutes of great material here, and it's absolutely worth the ticket price to see it. You maybe wouldn't name him as the greatest living stand-up comedian anymore, but he's still definitely worthy of your attention.
Over at Soho Theatre, you can mark clown comic Sami Abu Wardeh down as a solid 'one to watch', based on his debut hour. The nature of the show means elements will work better on some nights than others, but it's a pretty evenly-paced hour - you're always going to have a fun, easy-going time in his company. He handles a lightly-disruptive audience well (always an encouraging sign) - at one point we're invited to suggest films for an improvised section and Wardeh has a great time toying with how inappropriately sad some of the suggestions are.
Finally, a curious one-off event from Romesh Ranganathan. Long known to be a fan of the music genre, Ranganathan has been championing the excellent US hip-hop duo Marlowe lately. He's not really been going about it in the usual ways though - instead making a cameo appearance in a comedy interlude on their recent third album, where he essentially raps as if it's an audition, in the hope that they'll let him join their group. It's surreal enough to hear a British comedian guest so prominently on the album of a US artist, even before considering the fact that Ranganathan has seemingly hammed up his Britishness for the guest spot.
Keen to double down on their creative partnership, Ranganathan joined the London date of their UK tour to make it something of a joint gig - an 'experiment', as Romesh was comfortable describing it. First, then, we got a straightforward stand-up comedy set from Ranganathan (good fun - and much of it has since become available in his new Netflix special, FYI), and then he interviewed the pair (solid, even if they both appeared to be flagging a little after celebrating their Manchester show the previous evening). Then, finally, a full gig by the hip-hop duo (definitely enjoyable, if not a league above their brilliant recorded work).
Ranganathan - presumably feigning reluctance - joins them for the finale, confirming that he's got the technical skillset to be a rapper, even if his overall demeanour is maybe a bit more 'cool schoolteacher' than 'hip-hop's next big thing'. In some ways having music and comedy together in one night feels a little old-fashioned. But it's a pleasure to see the idea updated, the two elements aligning so comfortably here. As experiments go, it's one to encourage more of.
Read previous editions of this column
Mark Muldoon is also available on Instagram and Twitter, should the mood take you.
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