Rob Brydon Live   Starring: Rob Brydon Universal Pictures RRP: £19.99 8272469 Certificate: 15 Available 23 November 2009

Following his sell-out national tour across the UK and a three week run at The Apollo Theatre in London’s West End, Rob Brydon has arrived with a new show on DVD. BAFTA nominated for his performance as Uncle Bryn in Gavin and Stacey, Brydon’s new show is abundant with audience interaction, fast paced humour, improvisation and impersonations. Rob describes the experience of becoming a dad at 42; the horrors of home-birthing; his obsession with owning new and unnecessary gadgets; his pondering on being Welsh and why Wales elicits such rabid, fun-poking by the rest of the country...

This review is going to be a little different than normal, as I'm only going to mention the content in the closing paragraphs (worry not, you're missing very little). Instead I'm going to talk about way the distribution company (Universal) seems to think it's okay to set down a string of ludicrous guidelines for us to follow. So, in case you're interested, here's a text book example of how to get up reviewers noses - courtesy of Universal Pictures:

Send out a check disc of a DVD (let's for argument's sake say Rob Brydon Live) almost a month after it's been released in the shops. Then include a rather patronising letter explaining that the DVD (or "Programme" as Universal likes to call it - with a handy definition of what "Programme" means to them) belongs to Universal at all times and infer that given half a chance reviewers will try and make some easy money by pirating the disc and selling the content on. Then describe how no one else is to have access to it (so I think our reviews editor broke that rule, as she gave it to me to review) and suggest that it should be locked in a safe place when not being viewed (oh, come on... this is getting ridiculous) and finally insist that the "Programme" is posted back to Universal by courier within two weeks at the reviewers expense.

So... let's get this straight... Our organisation has to fast track this "Programme" (because we have to have a review ready and the disc back at Universal within two weeks) and put it to the head of the pile for review (ahead of all those good companies who send us discs early and don't want us to send them back); Treat it like the crown jewels and lock it away securely; and after paying a reviewer to review it we are supposed to spend more money making sure it gets back to Universal. Is that putting the reviewer in the right frame of mind to view the "Programme" favourably? I think not. This seems to be a case of we scratch Universal's back and they extract the urine.

As it transpired the DVD's not particularly funny anyway. Brydon, who is getting on a bit now, is still using very old material and it did feel like an '80s comedy set. Which was a bit of a surprise to me as I enjoyed his acting in Rob Brydon's Annually Retentive.

Extras include Rob on Tour (17 min, 02 sec look behind the scenes); It's Hal out There (7 min, 13 sec look at the support act, Hal Cruttender - although sadly we don't get to see his act); Rob's Road Cam (3 min, 22 sec in which Rob points the camera out of his car window for a bit and manages to capture mainly footage of raindrops on the window).

Recommended for someone whose been in a coma since 1987.

2

Nick Smithson