REVIEW

JETHRO

WEYMOUTH PAVILION

Cornish comedian Jethro has been in the business for forty years yet shows no signs of slowing up as he is currently coming to the end of an extensive nationwide tour.

At 68 he looks slightly frail when he comes on stage but immediately gets into his stride and has us in stitches. Jethro delivers old school humour based primarily on bodily functions with a bit of casual misogyny. He knows that jokes about genitalia will always get a laugh.

His invariably dirty little tales involve primarily his character invention called Denzil with his wife often the butt of many of his jokes.

Yes, political correctness has passed Jethro by, but he’s so retro he may be coming back in fashion again.

It’s an act of predominantly blue humour honed in the boozed-up working men’s clubs and stag parties up and down the country over the years and goes down a treat with the Weymouth audience.

There are frequent musical interludes when his support act Shaun Perry sings a few well-known tunes in the portentous style typical of musicals to over-orchestrated backing tracks. Jethro himself has some musical moments singing Some Enchanted Evening in uncharacteristically straight operatic style. But his voice is still holding up.

There are no political references tonight and the only piece of topical humour he did was to reference Trump. ‘He had a break-in and the burglars stole all his books - and he hadn’t finished colouring them all in!’ Not great but pretty much the only one that could be published in this newspaper.

The most convincing part of his act was when he was strumming some guitar chords and relating some of tales over the top. It’s an effective way of delivering his often hilarious tales.

Jethro would never be popular at the Fringe but he has a created a comedy niche all of his own with his warm Cornish burr of a voice softening the edges of his particular brand of close to the bone humour.

GRAHAM JAMES