Motoring through the taste-free zone

A rumour circulating on the Edinburgh Fringe this summer was that Jimmy Carr's posters were the most defaced in the city. It was certainly believable. Oldschool lefties hate his knowing, non-PC gags, fashion radicals dislike his suits, and other comedians resent the fact that he hoovers up all the TV jobs.

No one can argue with this ex-marketing man's prolific work rate, though. His touring show Off the Telly is an almost all-new act. The format is familiar - a rhythmic, businesslike delivery plus a set-piece at his onstage desk - but Carr really grafts to make conventional comedy look this simple. It is a pity that he insists on gratuitously bashing the taste barrier at almost every opportunity.

He seems intent on appealing to a heckle-happy Zoo/Nuts demographic. There are heartless one-liners about homosexuality, incompetent female map-readers and Third World poverty that would easily appeal to Jim Davidson, who has allegedly used an old Carr gag before, albeit without employing the escape hatch of post- modern irony.

Carr can clearly be sophisticated. There is a philosophical allure to his line, "If your gran is alone in the house when she falls, does she make a sound?" And he scores points by sending up his own smug persona, undercutting his poshness with some unconvincing street-cred: "I went to one of the roughest colleges in Cambridge."

The weakest link, however, is not the political incorrectness, but the disappointing seated digression where he comes up with alternative greeting card messages such as "Get well soon...or your wife will start looking elsewhere." Although all sorts of things are excusable in comedy, being unfunny is not one of them.

Jimmy Carr - Public Display Of Affection