Review: Little Howard and the Magic Pencil of Life and Death – Newcastle Stand

It’s 12.30pm on a Sunday afternoon and the Newcastle Stand is rammed – but this isn’t your typical comedy club crowd.

The disruptive wailing from the front row isn’t Lightweight Barry, the groom-to-be who’s slowly-but-surely falling off his chair; that strange smell emanating from the corner of the room isn’t Smelly Jim on his first stag-do; and the heckling? Well, let’s just say today’s crowd can’t help themselves.

Welcome to Newcastle Kids Comedy Club, the latest addition to The Stand’s increasingly-diverse comedy programme.

The NKCC, as we’ll call it to save time, debuted in February. Stand-up Martin Mor hosted the show then, with a guest spot from local comic Steffen Peddie. It’s £4 for the kids and us grown-ups get in for nowt. I don’t know about you, but I think that’s a great deal…

Today’s NKCC is a special one, so no Martin or Steffen. Instead we’re treated to a partially-animated stand-up show from two boys called Howard.

Little Howard and the Magic Pencil of Life and Death is the work of comedian Howard Read, a.k.a. Big Howard. He and Little Howard, a six-year-old (virtual) stand-up comic, are a formidable team. Little Howard gets the best lines, of course, but it’s a real pantomime affair, with lots of engaging audience games (real-life Guess Who?!), fart jokes and a few cartoon villains!

Now, I’m an immature sod, but I’m probably not the best person to judge kids comedy. So I thought I’d draft in my sister Kate, aged 9 and a half, who was my ‘+1’ for the day. She said:

“Little Howard was the best bit. I liked Little Howard. The funniest part was when Little Howard was dressed as a policeman – and it was funny that [SPOILER ALERT] Big Howard didn’t tell him about his son. I liked The Stand because it smelled nice [NO IDEA WHAT THIS MEANS]. There was a weird bit though… Do you know that guy who was in the cloak? He had it on backwards at one point, but that was funny too.”

Put it this way, she’s not shut up about it.

But adults aren’t left twiddling their thumbs either. There’s plenty of bog-standard gags, nearly-swears, visual funnies and comedy in-jokes about…Jongleurs. It’s a clever show that works on a few levels – and it looks great too.

That’s probably the most rewarding aspect of comedy for kids; that the whole room laughs along regardless of age, race, sex and any of that rubbish.

I’ve always thought the hardest comedy to write is victimless comedy, but Howard Read makes it look easy.