HYENA Lounge Comedy Club promoter Toby Clouston-Jones has pulled off a coup by signing up Robert Newman, the one-time star of The Mary Whitehouse Experience and Newman & Baddiel In Pieces, for an exclusive trial show on Thursday in York.

Robert Newman’s Theory of Evolution: Work In Progress will be presented by the Hyena Lounge Comedy Club in City Screen’s Basement bar that night.

“Rob will be trying out material in advance of a major new UK tour,” says Toby. “Watch it evolve in front of your very eyes here in York.”

This year is the 20th anniversary of Newman’s comedy landmark. “It was 20 years ago that Rob became the first British comedy act to play an arena [the 12,000-seat Wembley Arena in December 1993], alongside his one time comedy partner David Baddiel,” recalls Toby.

“Immediately after the show, the duo split up and Rob largely disappeared from public life, before reappearing with solo work marked by a clear social conscience and anti-establishment views.

“His later shows have been characterised by a very strong political element and have paralleled the work of contemporaries such as Mark Thomas.”

Rob urges Thursday’s audience to “please note that this is a work in progress”. “This show will mostly be rough and ready new material, certainly not the polished finished article,” says the 48-year-old writer, comedian and Cambridge graduate. “I enjoy these sorts of gigs as you never know what is going to work and what is not, and I like the ramshackle improvised nature of new-material nights.”

Doors open at 7pm for the 7.30pm start and tickets cost £10 online at hyenalounge.com or on 0871 902 5726.

The experimental nature of the performance means that it is a “non-review event”. Sorry about that.