Sean Lock, De Lar Warr Pavilion, Bexhill, Mar 13 (From The Argus)

Sean Lock, De Lar Warr Pavilion, Bexhill, Mar 13

Either Sean Lock was having an off day or it’s a bad idea to choose which stand-up to see based on their appearances on comedy panel shows.

Don’t get me wrong: as a stand-up, Lock is funny, likeable and sometimes spot-on with his observations on, for example, the 1970s diet of mince and squash. This rang true for the heckler who added “Vesta curries” to the mix – surely one of the strangest heckles a comedian has ever had to deal with.

However, Lock wasn’t quite as off-the-wall as his regular spot on QI suggests and, in fact, much of his material – on being a dad, supermarkets and those with a wheat intolerance – was rather middle-of-the-road, while an attempt at audience interaction where selected punters were invited to submit words about which Lock would then find a joke in his not-very-extensive book of material fell flat.

Strangely, he returned to this format for the show’s lacklustre finale. If he’d have picked me, I’d have requested “joke” and helped him out.

That’s the thing about Sean Lock: he may not be as sharp or as witty as half an hour of carefully-edited footage suggests, but he’s still a nice guy.