Andrew O’Neill

Komedia, Brighton, Tuesday, September 18

THERE is something very mysterious about seeing Andrew O’Neill, and that’s on a regular night.

This, however, is no regular night, this is Andrew O’Neill performing what is, in his words, his favourite show ever.

Over the course of just over an hour the 39-year-old (What!?) winds his way through references to cages, ghosts - well just one ghost, and tennis.

Before all that it is the job of Maisie Adam to get the crowd warmed up.

The Yorkshire-born stand-up has lived in our fair city for six months, congratulating herself for not having turned vegan yet...one day tofu will get her.

It’s fair to say that perhaps Maisie and the man who follows her on stage don’t have quite the same target audiences.

Despite that she does still manage to get a few laughs out of the partisan crowd, big things could be in store for this 24-year-old so keep your eyes peeled.

Andrew O’Neill makes quite the entrance when it is his time to come to the stage.

Entering covered in white paint and other markings, that actually compliment his tattoos very well, wearing a horned helmet and reciting a spell to invoke to Mercury, the god of the spoken word.

The show starts a little slow, although this is no fault of Andrew’s as a heckler disrupts the opening portion of the performance before he is roundly told to shut up.

What follows is a bizarre show that is exactly what you’d expect from a man with Andrew’s reputation.

Spurted shouts of “Come on Tim!” and “We must cage them!” seem out of place but eventually pay off in an extremely funny manner.

Come on Tim is definitely the highlight, playing off the shouts that greeted Tim Henman as he attempted to take home the Wimbledon crown.

Something that Andrew references frequently is that he is lucky to have a hardcore following of fans, that is most likely because he comedy is certainly not for everyone.

You have to have an acquired taste to sit through an hour of stories about invoking spirits, but there is something very humourous about the way he bounds about the stage.

Songs about his cat follow, rewording classic metal songs like Don’t Fear The Reaper and Enter Sandman to sing to his fluffy pet, Ghost, a name he didn’t pick but definitely isn’t complaining about.

Andrew frequently mentions that this is his favourite show ever, and you can tell by the smile etched across his face throughout the duration.

That passion translates to the crowd and makes for a very enjoyable evening for all who turned out to see him.

Jamie Walker