Shock jock's loathsome charm

Talk Radio by Eric Bogosian
Udderbelly
***

The Comedians' Theatre Company, founded by Phil Nicol, aims to capitalise on the recent critical successes at the Fringe of Twelve Angry Men and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, which had casts heavily populated by comics keen to show their actorly bent.

Its debut is Eric Bogosian's Eighties play, which centres on Barry Champlain (Nicol), an opinionated, self-obsessed shock jock on a Cleveland radio station. Champlain's contempt for humanity becomes ever more bilious (but very funny) as a parade of misfits phone his late-night show to air their views.

Champlain humiliates his callers with withering put-downs and in between delivers homilies that reveal a lost soul whose wit appeals, but whose loathsomeness appals. Nicol plays to perfection the simmering rage of a man fast approaching a breakdown. Stewart Lee (of Jerry Springer: The Opera fame) directs in the barn-like space of the Udderbelly, where much of the play's intimacy and darkness are lost.

In what is effectively a monologue for Nicol, the other actors in an eight-strong cast are reduced to bit players, although Will Adamsdale more than holds his own as a starstruck fan. But Nicol gives a towering performance, and one that more than justifies the new company's existence.

Until 28 August. Information: 0870 745 3083).