Nick Revell: Sleepless

Nick Revell is probably right when he tells us he’s just delivered “the most elegant vaginally based joke you’ll hear at the Festival.” This is partly because there aren’t that many elegant vagina jokes this year (something to aim for next year), but mostly because Revell’s set is very elegantly written, unsurprising given how long he’s been at the coalface of British comedy.

The stand-up and writer is most well known for his work on one of the best satires of the nineties, Drop the Dead Donkey, which mercilessly sent up journalism. In Sleepless he seems to be again embracing the news as he whips around the world’s troubles at breakneck speed.

Revell admits that the title of his show is merely a linking device to enable him to discuss the many things that he thinks about late at night, not least the ever popular stupidity of governments and organised religion. Some stranger thoughts also keep him up and he has developed some healthily original thoughts on bird calls and happy-slapping cats to construct this set.
He is also excellent at projecting his voice without inhibition and the time-honoured impression of a Frenchman and other hilariously accurate parodies get some of the best responses from the crowd.

But despite the high quality writing and glimpses of well conceived original material, there is something about Revell’s show which stops it being laugh-out-loud funny. His broad sweep of international subject matter evokes low-level amusement, but no uncontrollable hilarity. Only his more inane digressions get a big response, which is a shame when his writing talent is so obviously still as strong as it was a decade ago.