Michael Barrymore

Our Review:

16 September 2003

The last two years have seen a cataclysmic fall from grace for Michael Barrymore, previously one of Britain's most popular family television entertainers, as prurient interest in his difficult personal life has completely overtaken that in his career.

But if his new live show at Wyndham's Theatre is an attempt both to return him to his live stage roots (where he began as a Butlin's Redcoat) and rehabilitate his image as a popular entertainer, it fails dismally - not least because, away from the bite-sized, edited portions of television lunacy, Barrymore just isn't very funny. And now that his image is so heavily tarnished, he isn't particularly likeable, either.

Most fatally, however - and inexcusably given the steep £38.50 top price - is that he's not at all prepared for a solo stage show: he simply doesn't have any material to stretch across less than a meagre hour and a half's stage traffic.

Not since Jeffrey Archer starred in his own 2000 play The Accused...