Irishman Dara O’Briain walked out with boundless energy, recounting funny tales that mainly took shots at himself in the first of three nights at the Lyric Theatre
O’Briain returned to Salford last Thursday in the middle of his current stand-up tour.
The crowd lapped up such tales of how he acts as a parent and the role he took on as a teacher for his kids during the pandemic.
It is rare, from experience, that Dara O’Briain ever pushes the line of crude humour. If he does it is rare he does it to offend anyone. It is a testament to Dara, the way that he effortlessly works the crowd.
It was a show that had the audience locked in throughout the two-and-a-half-hour performance.
When he interacted with people in the front row, he turned mundane jobs into whimsical tales just from the small details. Almost every comedian uses crowd interactions, but with Dara, it always felt fresh with each new person he spoke to.
It’s rare that you get to see O’Briain being sentimental, revealing personal information about himself. He admitted that the pandemic left him with no choice but to try to find comedy material from within.
The result was Dara revealing his search to try and find his birth mother, the process and the impact that search has had on his life.
He manages to talk about the very serious issues of adoption within Ireland over the last 50 years, with great sensitivity and also ease as well. It is a wonderful tale that is well worth the ticket price alone.
This was not the only topic of the show and the show does have a hilarious slow build across many topics before we reach the emotional story.
It was a wonderful evening of comedy by the famous Mock The Week host.
Tour dates for the rest of his tour can be found here.