Edinburgh festival `99 Reviews: Comedy

Jason Byrne

Pleasance, Venue 33, 0131-556 6550, 8.35pm, to 30 August

Either the audience thought they were on The Generation Game or had slipped something into their drinks. If they weren't lining up to do impressions of Riverdance they were dragging him across the stage on his stomach and screaming Boyzone songs. Even Byrne had to concede that they were unusually animated as he shouted: "Does anyone know what the hell is going on?"

Well, no, actually. Byrne is forever forgetting to finish his jokes. There are props on the stage that never get used and "experiments" that don't seem to go anywhere. Byrne is a great improviser and it's easy to carried away with his charisma - his facial expressions alone are worth the price of a ticket. But you can't help feeling that his predilection for audience humiliation is a smokescreen for a lack of material.