Stand-up works best in a small space. For those of you who relish the dank, basement venues, the airless bomb shelters with no windows, will appreciate how intimate performances are always better than stadium halls. Yet Mark Watson manages to keep that old-school intimacy by opening his set from the back seat the Pleasance Grand and ambling down the stairs, giving everyone a few minutes of one on one. Whether this is because he twigged I was press I don't know but he performed about ten minutes of his set stood a foot away from my seat. His ambling, up and down the stairs, was a fantastic way to warm up the audience, their swivelling heads following this energetic man wherever he chose to ramble.
Once more he dove into the obsessively observational, stressing over the smallest of things (see Travelodge story for more information) and falling in love with the rarest of events (see pigeon flying into man's face). There was a little sprinkle of recycled material which, while necessary at times, is always a little bit of a disappointment for returning viewers – which is a large amount of audiences in the bigger venues.
I have noticed that Watson is a little bit less Welsh each time I see him, his accent punctured with more and more of the Bristolian timbre – we collectivity wonder if he'll do an Izzard and just one day just end up doing his sets in his neutral RP. His material and comedic talent is strong enough that he doesn't need a character - that said everything is funnier in Welsh or as he would have it; 'The welsh accent pulls you through the worst of it'
[Alex Forsyth]
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