It's Friday night and I'm in the gallery at the Bedford Arms in Balham, laughing my head off at Geoff Boyz, a very funny man, with great material and superb delivery.

The place is packed and in stitches, all except for my friend Tom. Geoff, one of the abiding stars of London's comedy circuit, has narrowly survived a chainsaw attack on his act by a crazed, bald man. Just 30 seconds on the stage and the Heckler from Hell, apropos of nothing, shouts: "I love the Yorkshire Ripper!"

He follows this with a ragged volley of equally loud and offensive remarks. Things look like turning nasty Geoff's in real trouble.

But the audience is behind him and when heckler's girlfriend finally clamps her hand over his mouth, Geoff is free to perform.

And he does, his gravely Glaswegian voice leading us on a journey through the joys of life in 21st century.

Deep in the nightmare that is the Underground, Geoff's lips ooze round the mike as he recreates the incomprehensible noise that passes for announcements. At the airport checkout, he recreates the petty sex wars that shape so much of our relationship with the opposite sex. "We are strange, we are weird, we are people," he muses.

And when he does De Niro, well, he doesn't do him, he morphs into him. If it wasn't so funny it would be seriously scary.

He is the first act up and after 25 minutes, I reckon we have already had our £10 worth. All except Tom. He told me afterwards that he'd seen Geoff before and thought he was the business. But two months on, absolutely nothing in his act had changed, except for a few almost obligatory references to Bin Laden. Second time around, "live comedy" is as dead as a dead fish lying dead on the fishmonger's slab.

So come on comedians, if you want us to come back and we really want to then you need to give us a large helping of fresh material.

November 6, 2001 13:30