Ian Waller enjoys a great night of comedy at Corsham’s premier venue
And so Pound Arts keeps up its record of just excellent performers gracing its stage. In the past I’ve had the chance to enjoy theatre, music, poetry, art and comedy – plus a good few lunches – at this great little venue in central Corsham, and every one has been a real success.
This time around it was one of the Britain’s biggest and best comedy stars, Miles Jupp, he of loads of comedy panel shows, as well as being an author and popping up in any number of films, plays and TV series.
The occasion saw Miles bringing his new show, On I Bang, for a pre-tour try-out in front of a not surprisingly sold-our audience before it heads off to bigger venues around the country. In fact, it was so new that Miles brought the still warm script onto the stage with him!
While getting such a well loved and respected comedy star to play in Corsham was a well-deserved feather in the cap of Pound Arts, it’s actually not that rare a success, with comedy big wigs Chris McCausland and Omid Djalili also coming up soon (although both are predictably already sold out).
It’s always great to watch Miles Jupp, either with his stand-up or taking on dramatic stage parts. He’s got that wonderful posh bloke character combined with a keen eye to the absurdities of modern life that allows him to take the mick out of all areas of society from an apparent upper class viewpoint that actually has a very streetwise element.
This time, the focus of the evening was his diagnosis a couple of years ago of brain tumour and the process in getting it removed. OK, yes, fair enough, it’s not obviously the jumping out as the material for laugh out loud comedy, but Miles did the business, using the core subject to poke fun at families, politics, social etiquette and anyone in a four wheel drive car.
So we’re steered towards anecdotes of family holidays in Wales with Miles attempting to squeeze into a wetsuit while his youngest – of five children – wees in another families bucket, lovey actor-type chats on the set of films, that brain tumour thingy and even the challenges of obtaining anal swabs while being asked about lunch requirements.
Among my favourites was him comparing his mum and dad trying to operate Amazon’s Alexa to giving the Hadron collider to a pair of Jack Russell!
Throughout Miles has a genius in his delivery, with every aside, apparent ad-lib and side swipe eliciting cries of laughter from an appreciative audience.
So once again Pound Arts succeeds – a great production in a wonderful setting with just the lengthy queue for the bar the only very minor down point (when it comes to the interval drink, I recommend ordering in advance!).
For a list of upcoming events at Pound Arts, go to https://poundarts.org.uk/