Review: Dave Gorman’s Powerpoint Presentation – Theatre Royal, Newcastle

If Frankie Boyle is the Mick Jagger of comedy – the outspoken voice of the disenfranchised youth, dehumanised and demonised by the press, and feared by parents nationwide – then Dave Gorman is Ringo Starr.

He’s an everyman; he’s well-known and provides entertainment in a variety of guises, but he still gives the impression he’d be incredibly polite if he ever met your mother.

It is this cuddly persona, coupled with Gorman’s regular appearances on television, radio, and other family-friendly environments, that prompts a childish sense of joy whenever he swears -which he does within seconds at Newcastle’s Theatre Royal, introducing his support act as ‘fucking hilarious’.

It’s a bold claim, which Jay Foreman does his best to live up to in his 30 minute set. Striding onstage armed with a guitar, Foreman breaks the ice with a pleasingly cynical song about the royal wedding. During the following patter, he brings a group a latecomers up to speed with a lightspeed rendition of the song, to great audience response.

Jay Foreman is terrifically erudite, defying grammatical rules for maximum comic effect, and utilising musical jokes as skilfully a lyrical ones. He is so well spoken that not a single word gets lost and, unusually for a musical comic, he’s also a fantastic guitarist. From every angle, Foreman is faultless.

It is difficult to discuss specific songs or their titles without providing spoilers, but his endearing sense of humour is akin to a musical Jon Richardson; a dour Gavin Osborn; or an accessible Stephen Lynch.

Loading his PowerPoint, Dave Gorman gets the gimmicks out of the way immediately, and quickly launches into a series of routines informed by a slide of autobiographical information – taking in such topics as the correlation between marriage and physical attractiveness; errors gleaned from Wikipedia and Jewish print media; and the merits & perils of using the internet.

In fact, Gorman gets a little obsessed with the internet – launching into an increasingly intense discussion of a fictional alternative reality containing the characters of smart phone marketing campaigns.

He also goes to great lengths to share his opinions on manners; discuss the importance of context in communication; and dissect the conventions of stand-up and psychoanalyse audience expectations.

Every routine in this show would work perfectly well without the presence of a large projector screen, but 750 slides of constantly evolving visual content makes the experience exponentially better.

True to convention, Gorman takes his empirical zeal to silly extremes, conducting his own experiments from home and expressing the results with his beloved bar graphs and pie charts.

Fans of Gorman’s Absolute Radio show will be pleased to hear that the popular ‘found poem’ feature makes an appearance in the show – and anyone expecting a similar sense of humour won’t be disappointed (although you can expect more drama and intensity with the stand-up show).

A brilliant Rhod Gilbert-esque dynamic arc runs throughout the night, ranging from calm, friendly reasoning to outright rage. At his most irate, Gorman destroys his cuddly Ringo Starr image like Thomas the Tank Engine derailing and ploughing through the Fat Controller’s house.

Dave Gorman also shares Gilbert’s talent for impeccably timed and pitched callbacks, epitomised in a closing routine on the Royal Wedding, closing the loop on his support act’s opening gambit.

I truly did not know what to expect of Dave Gorman live, especially given his recent return to straight stand-up. His PowerPoint Presentation provides a huge dose of personality, along with his characteristic wit and affability, while containing many surprises and packing a mean punch.