RIGHT-wing comic Jim Davidson once refused to perform for an audience which included a front row composed of wheelchair-users. By his reckoning, he couldn't have a laugh about people's disability when they were staring him right in the face. If Davidson felt this way about all the different categories of people he slags off in his act, he'd end up with no audience at all, says sit-down comic Laurence Clark.

Clark starts off by making sure there's nobody in the house expecting to see Jim Davidson, and then that Davidson himself is not in. His show begins with video clips of Davidson's act, perhaps the most shocking of which is a clip from the Daily Mirror in which the comic is quoted as saying "If women just liked to f*** a bit more, there'd be no rape cases".

Having demolished Davidson, Clark turns to clips of Tony Blair making promises he hasn't kept, and one particularly enlightening shot of Clark himself, in his wheelchair, being completely ignored by the Prime Minister, who is chatting to the two able-bodied people in the group.

As Clark points out, he speaks a little differently because of his cerebral palsy, but what he has to say is funny, poignant and thought-provoking.

There's not enough space to do justice to charismatic actor/musician Matt Fraser in support. I suggest you go along to the Arts Centre on 29 November and catch Thalidomide - A Musical, entirely written and scored by Fraser. That's if he can fit it in between auditions for Dr Who and Top of the Pops...

Published: 19/05/2005