SO, Ross, is there a theme to your show? I ask, because apparently this is the question he is most asked by we journalists. That and the one where we want to know if he is depressed away from the stage, in keeping with the long toll of sad clowns.
North Easterner Noble throws his eyes to the skies as he teases the fourth estate for the daftness of looking for a theme in a show built so spectacularly on improvisation. “Good luck with that,” he says. And no, he is definitely not depressed.
In fact, for all his gothic look in black clothes and wild mane, Ross Noble could well be the happiest man in the world, forever spinning comic gold through his spontaneous, often surrealist interaction with the crowd, in this case a York full house gathered for the first night of his 15th tour show.
Opening night means it's even more off the rails, with only a few fall-back positions for “structure”, namely Brexit (with a lovely prejudice-baiting twist on not trusting polls/Poles) and the thing that really annoyed him about the Olympics, although he kept veering off piste whenever he began to discuss it.
Brain Dump is a most apt show title. Random thoughts tumble out of him, nothing held back, until they fizz like Catherine wheels before something else catches his eye as he bounces around a stage filled with giant lightbulbs: symbols of ideas going off in his hyperactive head.
Where this new Noble show is a tornado of words, Alec Guinness mimicry, amusement and amazement, deadpan American Rich Hall is a more pinpoint comedian. He uses far fewer words, delivered in a drawl, everything nuanced and pared down for maximum effect.
Rich Hall: the American cynic enters "Britain's happiest city". Picture: Roddy Hand
Playing to close to 500 in the Theatre Royal’s redesigned, more intimate main house, Hall eases himself into his very measured set by commenting on York being officially the happiest place to live, a place at odds with his cynical, melancholic mien.
Whereas Noble’s whimsical comedy is pretty much all in the moment and full of wonderful, fluffy nonsense – “How can you review this?”, he keeps saying – the satirical, distilled, merciless Hall, by way of contrast, crafts immaculately structured routines and grumpy gags ripe for quoting and re-telling.
His appraisals of Clinton versus Trump and Brexit are as sharp as a diamond cutter and his lampooning is so clear, so concise, that you wish you could vote for him, such is his astute assessment of political woes on both sides of the Big Pond.
He keeps spotting the absurd and the ironic, in the comedic tradition of the observant outsider, and now dressing in hat, check shirt and jeans like Neil Young in his Earth farmer mode, Hall comes across as sage, concerned, world-weary yet not averse to veering off into humorous country songs and bantering with the front row.
If Ross Noble is scattergun, Rich Hall is the hitman.
Ross Noble: Brain Dump is on tour from September 27 to December 17. Dates include Harrogate Royal Hall, October 1; Leeds Town Hall, November 30 and December 1; Hull City Hall, December 13. Box office: Harrogate, 01423 502116 or harrogatetheatre.co.uk; Leeds, 0113 376 0318; Hull, 01482 226655
Rich Hall presents Rich Hall: Live 2016 at Harrogate Theatre, October 5, 8pm. Box office: 01423 502116 or harrogate theatre.co.uk.
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