Pam Ayres
Bloomsbury Theatre
***
Here is conclusive proof that if you stick around long enough you'll come back into fashion.
Pam Ayres might not have attained Arctic Monkey status, but with a refreshingly funny Radio 4 series, appearances on Countdown and this packed house, her stock probably hasn't been this high since 1976.
Thirty years after Opportunity Knocks, her whimsical poetry is as endearingly entertaining as ever.
Getting her hit out of the way early, she revealed that Oh, I Wish I'd Looked After My Teeth, bemoaning the perils of fillings and dentures, was written when she had all her choppers, so she clearly has a fertile imagination.
Slippage between self-image and reality was a rich vein of humour. The highlight was her fantasy of eloping with Bruce Springsteen: 'He's clapped in every State, I'm clapped by half past eight.'
Her mature audience sympathised. Ayres doesn't get hecklers, she gets rustlers - laughter was punctuated by the unwrapping of Werther's Originals.
Unfortunately, she stuck around a little too long at the Bloomsbury. A windy anecdote about her dogs tipped the gig over the two-hour mark and lost her a star.
More hip replacement than hip, perhaps, but an enterprising producer could surely squeeze a London run out of the people's poet.
