Review: Lee Nelson Live, Grand Opera House, York (From York Press)

Review: Lee Nelson Live, Grand Opera House, York

10:30am Tuesday 22nd November 2011 in Comedy

Lee Nelson

Comedy created via a persona is usually a very difficult thing to evaluate objectively; it’s often ironic, so it’s sometimes far more than a simple case of good or bad.

I think Lee Nelson makes things frighteningly easy, however. His persona is not cohesive, like Al Murray’s pub landlord. As far as I’m concerned, Nelson’s persona is just an idiot. Why an idiot? As an excuse for sub-par humour.

There’s no sense of social commentary here, and Nelson is certainly not transcendent of the baseness of his persona. The jokes are universally weak, and often offensive. To me, an offensive show is not intrinsically bad, but it must be counterbalanced by intelligence and crafted hilarity; these elements were notably absent from Nelson’s show last Friday.

The show is very varied, containing elements of audience interaction and dialogue between Nelson and his “best mate” Omelette, who is extremely fat and fairly inactive.

As such, he makes a strange stage presence; the fact that he is overweight should, apparently, be humorous enough in itself.

I can think of no good reason to go and see Lee Nelson Live; for myself, I found it unfathomable, unpalatable and, most of all, unfunny. His fans may disagree – but I would say that even if you find listening to Nelson remotely amusing, the list of more productive things to do with your time is, undeniably, very long indeed.

- James Harle