Eric Rushton opens to a packed room — sold out, with queues outside for returns. Winner of the Channel 4 Sean Lock Comedy Award and Leicester Mercury Comedian of the Year, Rushton hits the stage as a consummate professional — if not always in the most professional manner. He hypes the crowd, feels out the energy, teases it, and settles into a rhythm that’s completely his own.

Self-effacing jokes interspersed, he builds Innkeeper around what it’s like to be a man who may not be conventionally attractive — anchored by a very funny childhood memory of being downgraded in his Nativity role as an innkeeper.

Rushton isn’t chasing big improvised exchanges, but when he does interact with the audience, it feels genuine, pulling us into the show. Several in the crowd have followed him from short 15-minute sets around the country, saying they found him incredibly funny then and expected more of the same here. No one in that room was left disappointed.

His jokes are wry, insightful, and often carry more depth than the usual Fringe stand-up. He talks about mental health — on a path often over trodden by comics — keeping a self-awareness that keeps him a step ahead of us and has us laughing hard throughout. More than once, he catches our response and uses it against us wittily.

The ending is neat work, flipping the central premise — that he was undesirable — on its head.

 He raises questions about how we perceive ourselves and who we truly are. That in-between space is where Rushton finishes — though it’s the one area that could use a final polish.

Sharing existentialism with an audience who may not have thought much about it, while still making it relatable and funny.

Although I’m damned if I would know how he’d do that

Meticulously written, funny throughout, and clearly honed through hard work on the circuit.

Innkeeper is an excellent hour of comedy. No wonder it sold out. A thinking man’s comedian with a gift for subverting standard tropes hilariously.

****½

Reviewed by Sharpie

Monkey Barrel Hionkve

15.20 (1hr)

Until 24 Aug (not 12)