Jethro Live Back of Beyond DVD review
December 4, 2007 – 2:13 pm | by Portia Nicholson
Jethro is one of those comedians with a certain Marmite quality about them, you either love the old bugger or he lives a vile taste in your mouth. Not being a Jethro fan I had somewhat of an open mind on his latest offerings.
His new DVD ‘the back of beyond’ is centered around his stand up comedy performed at his own West country club of the same title. The DVD is a mixture of stand up footage, sketches and an introduction by a cockney-mockney fellow called ‘Tucker’.
The DVD begins with a tour of Jethro’s club and shows Jethro hoovering his own club in preparation for the evening gig whist delivering a few one-liners for good measure and occasionally muttering “what a load of bollocks”. After this little publicity plug, Jethro begins his evening act and by surveying his audience demographic, I suspect that I am perhaps not his intended viewer. As I look closely at the crowd shots it appears that you cannot move for graying perms, flannel jackets and fish wives.
Despite his official website boasting that he is “the biggest selling character comic in Britain” Jethro plays it pretty safe and his gags never extend beyond, things that happened in the pub, the wife and the ways of the West Country. It is clear that while this sort of comedy maybe popular with a certain generation, the whole viewing experience leaves me feeling rather uncomfortable. This is maybe because there is a certain dogmatic, backward almost offensive way about his comedy that just doesn’t sit right with me.
Like a poor man’s Roy Chubby Brown, he is armed with a series of unpleasant one-liners that in all honesty could be perceived as hugely offensive by certain groups of people. I realise that comedy is meant to push the boundaries of what we find amusing but his material is frankly bordering on distasteful. The correct delivery of offensive comedy is crucial, we laugh as long as we have faith the comedian does not hold these views personally. I somehow get the feeling with Jethro that he actually believes in and fully endorses his questionable views and opinions. This is provocative comedy but without any intelligence to it. Still at least the harpies were cackling.
There is also the tired predictability to his gags “I used to have a twin, we were identical until she shaved her beard off” and perhaps many one too many tales about what an awful nag the wife is. He even throws in a few “there was an Englishman, an Irish man and a Welsh man” jokes, which make it hard to believe that this was a comedy performance filmed in 2007.
Jethro rather than a top comedian reminds me more of a pissed uncle recounting family stories of yesteryear, after 17 pints too many down the local. It’s not that the man isn’t funny but I think his humour is largely misplaced, which is a great shame as if you can sit through the entire performance there are some comedic gems that are hidden within his odious performance.
