Steve Coogan, Hammersmith Apollo, London

"He looks good dressed as a woman doesn't he?" says my friend with the same kind of gossipy Northern twang that the object of his comment, Steve Coogan's Pauline Calf, is adopting on stage. Steve Coogan does indeed look convincing in a dress, so much so that I check behind me to see if Jerry Hall is still there. Hall is one of the assembled luminaries, including Alan Yentob, Jimmy Carr and Rob Brydon, here to see if Coogan can shake off some of the bad publicity he's had in the early part of his tour.

The aforementioned Pauline Calf with her Barry Manilowesque tribute to a certain hotel chain is a gentle start but, like a slightly classier Lily Savage, she gets her teeth into some more robust material later on, for example describing how she organised a Miss Wet Burka competition on holiday on Dubai.

Elsewhere in the parade of characters Coogan's most amiable character, clueless roadie-turned-pest controller Tommy Saxondale, doesn't win many new friends tonight with a plodding musical number about a lost hippy love, and old school comedian and ventriloquist creation Duncan Thicket is looking as doddery as the genre he's aping.

Like a pair of old shoes, Coogan slips into Alan Partridge comfortably in the second half and though not a warm performer himself this familiarity breeds goodwill in an audience relieved that the patchy first half is behind them.

Though never using the "aha!" catchphrase, Partridge's supply of bluster is a wake-up call for an audience which can return home safe in the knowledge that their comic hero, now a Hollywood player, still has the old magic in his locker.

Touring to 14 December (www.chortle.co.uk)