Sportsmans – Gilded Balloon Teviot

Jul 31 – 26 Aug £10-11

7pm

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Engaging character comedy from rejuvenated Joe Bor (www.joebor.co.uk).  Bor has been on the comedy scene for a while but seems to have struggled to make a big impression.  His credits include being warm up comedian on the Graham Norton Show amongst others.  With his new creation, Prince William lookalike, Jasper Cromwell Jones he seems to have cracked it.   I was thinking going into this that using an Alan Carr quote on your flyer might put a lot of people off but this proved not to be the case and the 100 capacity venue inside the warren of Teviot House was choc full.

While the subject material is nothing ground breaking the delivery and narrative give this show the thumbs up.  Bor gets right into character as a complete toff who has just come back from an ill-fated climbing expedition in Peru and is now launching a book about the debacle.

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He appears from a tent prop on the stage and introduced himself, making use of projector images to illustrate the story and highlight Jaspers lack of common sense and intelligence.  It’s a laugh every few seconds for the whole hour.  Bor coped well with audience distractions  and also proved he can ad-lib as he picks out a couple of posh boys in the crowd and has a “posh off” with a rugger-top clad lad who admits to playing “soggy biscuit” (you don’t want to know!)  He leads us through Jaspers life “on the lash”, his relationship with his friends including Barny Fish fingers, drinking songs.  “Fishy” turns out to be played by comic Jack Whitehall in a section of hilarious video diary. This was a very funny performance from a comedian who could well have more cracking characters up his sleeve. Spiffing show old chap! FIVE STARS

Reviewer David McMenemy