Review: Rob Brydon @ Southport

Rob Brydon, otherwise known as Uncle Bryn of Gavin and Stacey fame, took to the stage in Southport tonight as himself, and I really didn’t know what to expect. Would he be in character as Uncle Bryn? Would I be left disappointed if he wasn’t? Anyway I was really looking forward to it, and took my seat in the very homely Convention Centre.

Even though I was up in the Gods, I still felt quite close to the stage, although I did leave my glasses at home so I had to do the whole squinty eye thing where you think you're zooming in but in actual fact you’re making it more blurry.

Anyway, I didn’t let this get me down, and pretty soon after Mr Brydon finally made an appearance. On stage Rob Brydon made it look so effortless. It seemed as if most of the act was ad libbed. He wove intricate stories around members of the audience as he chatted with most of the two front rows.

I felt a tad left out being so far away, however I was enjoying the banter being exchanged between the punters and the main man. Comedians always seem to have an amazing skill in getting the upper hand on audience members no matter what they throw back at them, and Brydon was no exception to this.

The one criticism I would say of Brydon would be that it appears he finds it hard to ‘play’ himself and how to pitch his personality. Half the time he's an outdated mimic: Ronnie Corbett, Bruce Forsyth, Tom Jones, Johnny Mathis – as good as they are, they belong in the past.

The show finished with Rob Brydon singing a medley of classic hits, including Lionel Richie’s ‘Hello’ and George Michael’s ‘Gotta Have Faith’, but sung in a number of hilarious Welsh accents. He then sang an old Led Zeppelin classic weaving a storyline around all the members of the audience he had talked to during his show, which shown brilliant ad-libbing and thinking on his feet, which had the audience in stitches.

The encore was never going to be anything else apart from him singing Islands in the Stream, especially with it being the week he clinched his first number one in the UK charts. It was a great ending to an enjoyable and happy show, and had the whole audience singing along, creating a real feelgood atmosphere.

It was definitely a show worth seeing, and I would say it was just about worth the £15 ticket price. He was very entertaining, despite not being as funny as I thought he might be, but the show still had enough laughs to send you home feeling satisfied

7/10