Review: Daniel Kitson
Comedy Big Top
Saturday 11 October 2003
By Mark Harris
Having regularly packed the Glee Club, bearded 2002 Perrier winning comedian Daniel Kitson was initially somewhat phased by his arrival at the Comedy Big Top.
Situated for five days of the Evening Mail Birmingham Comedy Festival alongside the Nature Centre on the Pershore Road, the huge tent was billed as part of a national comedy festival entitled Stand-Up UK which will later tour to Manchester, Glasgow and Newcastle.
The audience may have been slightly smaller than he Kitson would now normally expect to play to - such are the rewards of a Perrier - yet he quickly dismissed the "misconceived venue", making light of the lack of circus attractions and quickly offering a heckler the chance of a full refund, plus £6 extra as compensation to make up for the scarcity of traditional clowns and performing horses.
Tellingly, the heckler declined ...
After referring to the England/ Turkey match earlier that evening, his topics included Virgin Trains, US R'n'B diva Mary J Blige and the problems he faced recently with family and friends when he discovered he had thread worms!
At the top of his profession, an increasingly bitter and twisted edge seems ready to consume him, but so far he appears able to keep it at bay and keep the laughs rolling.
Revealing a few tricks of the trade - the value of doing some local research before a gig and 'the comeback', the referencing of earlier jokes later in the set - Kitson remains one of the most inspired comedians of his generation.
England may have managed a disappointing nil-nil draw, but Kitson certainly scored tonight.
Comedy Festival 
