Hackney Empire, London
The crossword-setting comic has lost none of his zest as he noodles in the nooks and deep-dives into the details
Struggling for comedy work under lockdown, Dave Gorman developed a sideline as a cryptic crossword setter, for this newspaper and others. It makes sense: his screen-based standup has always been animated by dorky compulsiveness and pattern-finding in unlikely places. That much is certainly true of new show PowerPoint to the People – but it’s not Gorman’s best work. As ever, he lavishes disproportionate attention and energy on vanishingly trivial subjects. But he doesn’t always find the trick or flourish to transcend triviality and make his geeky inquiries worthwhile.
There’s lots of great stuff around the margins, of course: at 51, Gorman has lost none of the zest he brings to his noodling in the nooks that the rest of us overlook. But his big set-pieces feel paltry. Too much of the first half is devoted to a deep-dive into the TV show Inside the Factory, and host Gregg Wallace’s apparently childlike demeanour – which Gorman strains to establish. The show culminates in a stunt based around a novelty hotel, the secrets of which Gorman swears us to protect. No problem, alas: they aren’t exciting enough to spill.
