Matt Kirshen: Wide-eyed

Imagine if standup could exist in a controlled environment. Infinite rain-free weekends, purpose-built venues and handpicked, sell-out crowds – how dull.

Unpredictability is part of what makes live comedy special, but on a sodden school night Matt Kirshen is really up against it. A feeble intro sees him squander his chance to grab the audience, so when their beer-filled bladders need emptying the early disruption is enough to tip the show into a nosedive.

Nerdy Kirshen isn't one to seize command of a room. His wry, well-written takes on miserable Britain, larger-than-life America and his own cringe-worthy gaucheness demand close attention. When a heckler hijacks the show, he is defenceless.

Even to mention this cretin grants him more attention than he already snatches, but his calamitous presence exposes a pre-existing flaw in Kirshen’s act. The diminutive standup suffers from an Ed Miliband-style lack of charisma that could render even the strongest material impotent.

Even when the saboteur shuts up—slobbering into his empty can, perhaps—it's clear the ideas aren’t quite there. Bits on air travel and sporting homoeroticism are uninspiring, while Kirshen’s attempts at biting sarcasm are declawed by his meekness.

He claims, semi-convincingly, to enjoy the show "in a perverse kind of way", and in a perverse kind of way the heckler does drive home his theme of embarrassment. But Kirshen's “default face” says it all: grinning, but with an unmistakable despair in his eyes. 

That a portion of the audience stays behind to offer words of support is an encouraging sign, but a more robust performer would not attract such sympathy.