Reviving a dry, demotic wit

What jokes would Bill Hicks be telling if he were alive today? Would he still be skewering smugness and sentimentality? Still deriding corporate whores and know-nothing bores? And, most importantly, can the Texan's dry demotic be revived by an impersonator and still deliver the gut laughs he saw as sacred?

Well, the good news is that Chas Early gives this rollicking reincarnation integrity and wit. 'My spirit can be returned to Earth, albeit in the body of a little-known British actor,' announces Early's Hicks, before shedding his angel wings, lighting a Marlboro and reflecting on the exalted regard he's been held in ever since he died from cancer in 1994.

'Every comedian who doesn't do dick jokes is compared to me,' he growls, before going on to relocate old targets Ronald McDonald and the NRA. New hate objects include Dido and the desperate Democrats: 'John Kerry, is that the best they can do? John Kerry makes Al Gore look like Alice Cooper.' (The show debuted at Edinburgh last summer, where Kerry gags would have been more vital.)

So, as a piece of pastiche, it's terrific. The bad news is that Early's imitation of the inimitable - just as for those actors who've aped Tommy Cooper or The Goons - is a triumph of acting but only so-so comedy. After all, the reason Hicks is lionised is precisely because he was not second-guessable.

This material, coming through veils of performance and supposition, inevitably lacks the punch of great stand-up. Nice try - but the joke wears thin over 90 minutes.

Tonight, Fri and Sat, then Jun 1 to 4, Soho Theatre and Writers Centre, 21 Dean Street W1, 8pm and 9.45pm, Jun 1 to 4 8.30pm, £10, £8 concs (Fri and Sat returns only). Tel: 0870 429 6883. www.sohotheatre.com Tube: Tottenham Court Road/ Piccadilly Circus