He kicks off the show with getting a few comments from locals – “if Boston was a type of a car it would have to be a souped up Ford Escort with furry dice in the window” – and then quickly gets down to business. And it immediately becomes clear that he’s got the crowd very much on his side. The audience interaction is actually really quite brilliant. There’s a warmth to the gig, and Steel is relaxed enough to work in the reactions and words of his audience well. He even brings in a sprout farmer at one point and gets him to sell the benefits of his produce. We don’t want to spoil the gig by revealing too much else, but this is very much a local comedy spot, done by an extremely talented comedian. And it works really well, whether you’re from Boston or not. The glue to it, of course, is Steel himself who clearly has fun with the project for the project, and also a lot of funny gags. His homework pays off too – it’s blatantly clear that there’s a lot more than a Wikipedia scan that’s gone into putting the material together. Mark Steel’s In Town (Boston) is on Radio 4 Wednesday 25th March at 6.30pm. Next week, he heads to Lewes…
