Show Me the Funny

(ITV1)

FORTY years ago this summer, ITV came up with a revolutionary new way to bring new comedy talent into our homes, writes Mark Andrews.

Polished performers such as Jim Bowen, Mike Reid and Charlie Williams, who had spent years honing their craft on the club circuit, were invited to perform in front of millions of viewers.

The Comedians was a stroke of genius.

And how we could do with a show like that today. Too much of today’s stand up is of the sneery, posh-boy variety. Comics make their name at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival before settling down to a career on panel games, where every gag is about politics or bodily functions.

Where are today’s Dave Allens, Stan Boardmans, or Frank Carsons?

But if Show Me The Funny, where 10 aspiring comics compete for the prize of a nationwide tour, was meant to revive the spirit of The Comedians, it fell flat on its face.

Fronted by Jason Manford, Show Me The Funny failed on two counts. Firstly, why did it have to be a reality show? I suppose in 2011 the idea of comedians just going on stage and making people laugh would be achingly uncool. But a comedy club based on the format of The Apprentice?

You’ve read that right. Each of the 10 hopefuls was sent out on a task – some had to work in a hairdressers’, others had to track down girls called Michelle. Then after performing in front of an all-female audience in Liverpool, the worst one got fired. Contrived or what?

But even worse was the standard of the acts. Single dad Cole Porter told a stunned audience he didn’t walk out on his baby daughter “because you never know when you will need a kidney donor.”

Self-styled ‘Half Spanish, half Welsh lothario’ Ignacio Lopez was met with an embarrassed silence when he claimed to have slept with half the crowd. His joke about growing a moustache to ‘look like a proper scouser’ was met with a similar reaction.

Then there was cockney schoolteacher Prince Abdi, who announced he couldn’t do a Liverpool accent before having a go anyway. Badly.

The only moments of comic relief came when the camera panned out to the judging panel, where Jimmy Tarbuck’s Roger Cook-like grimace perfectly summed up the mood of the evening.

Of course, the real aim of this show is to take us on another ‘journey’, where we follow the candidates through the highs and the lows of being transformed from unfunny, nervous wannabes, into skilled entertainers.

Well, I’m not sure I can be bothered.

Firstly, as judge Alan Davies said at the start, there are no short cuts to be being funny.

But more importantly, life’s too short. Had ITV trawled the clubs of Britain, it could have found plenty of seasoned, talented comics who would have brought the house down without any need to stand in front of Primark shouting “Oi, Michelle?”

People didn’t watch The Comedians to experience a learning curve. They watched it because it was funny.

That’s comedy.