The Noble art of waffle

"Digressions, incontestably, are the sunshine," wrote Laurence Sterne in Tristram Shandy, and indeed I have given up trying to compare Ross Noble with other comedians of his age. Oh, you can try: the name of Edward Izzard was bounced around the bar afterwards, and too those of Victor Reeves and Robert Mortimer. But Newcastle-born Noble, in his periphrastic determination not to arrive at the beginning of the show until tantalisingly close to the end, is the nearest I've seen any comic come to a comparison with the Irish master of the shaggy dog story.

His fluency is effortless these days, and the lurid blonde highlights are mercifully replaced by something easier on the eye. In between seeing him perform and writing this review, he will have popped over to Paris to amaze the boulevardiers, Izzard-style, in a show which I vainly hope contains more French than he demonstrated last Friday.

But it is hard to see his own Sentimental Journey through France (L Sterne, 1768) not bearing fruit. This most companionable of monologists could pick up any ball, and not just run it, but most probably combine that with the aforementioned shaggy dog. His meanderings depend entirely on who's in the house. Luckily, a woman interrupted his Jon Bon Jovi anecdote to say that she had taught JBJ's daughter music. You can imagine how many courses this added to the feast.

The one thing that doesn't come easily to Noble is stopping. An encore specialist, the post-bow show took up fully one quarter of his overall stage time, frustrating those who were winding down. And, when all's said and done, he is, really, just a mouthy kid talking bull. "A Cock and a Bull", for sure, said Sterne, who also said, "Of all the cants which are canted in this canting world ... the cant of criticism is the most tormenting." Enough said.

Next shows, November 29, December 1 and 2. Box office: 020 7478 0100.

Ross Noble