PAM Ayres has an incredible way with an audience.

In all honesty, I thought my fears of being out of place had been confirmed when I saw that last Wednesday’s audience were almost universally around 30 years my senior, but Pam was really one of the funniest comics I’ve seen, and it’s because of her rapport.

She just treats the audience like a huge roomful of friends; there’s no attempt to come off as slick or even over-confident, there’s no stage persona involved. The audience not only gets that, they also reciprocate it, creating an atmosphere in which it is difficult not to become caught up in the laughter.

Similarly, her poetry – which had seemed so limited to me confined to the page – worked beautifully in performance. The heavy rhyme schemes always led to anticipated punchlines, and with more than 30 years of experience, Pam plays them so well that you can’t help but laugh.

The narratives became complex at times: during one story about Singapore, especially, she was seemingly distracted by a story about contact lenses, during which she was distracted by a story about skiing, all accompanied by relevant poems. It seemed free and improvisational, but all three stories were tied up neatly, and the show’s flow maintained rapt attention.

Pam wasn’t trying to be witty, whether she ended up being witty or not; she was honest – and her act proves that sometimes, even with comedy, honesty can be the best policy.

Review by James Harle