COMEDY: Criminal (Wenlock & Essex, February 19, 2015)

Improv is always a bit like spinning plates, but what impressed me about Criminal is how many plates are spinning at once. First, there's the character each improviser is playing; second, there's the murder mystery plot, the structure of which is generally under more scrutiny than the average piece of genre fiction, because it's a puzzle that the audience like to understand; and third, the fact that one of the improvisers is the murderer, and must work to conceal this from the detective while still selectively engaging with them on the story. To borrow a phrase from someone much cleverer than me in matters such as this, it must be like being on stage with your hair on fire.

Joseph Morpurgo (Austentatious) was tonight's detective, a man whose music journalist hinterland was ploughed with spirit into on-stage debates about the merits of the Smiths and The Cure, a riff that even extended to a pocket discography of the former. Morpurgo has a wicked facility with words and it was put to extensive use here, with any slips turned into on-the-spot gags.

Wind back a minute, though. Before the mystery, the night launches with a compere who garners the setup of the crime from the audience, and the details of whose interactions with them form part of the platform for the improvisers - so biographical details about audience members become running gags during the unfolding story. My only worry about the format could be more mildly expressed as a contrast to other improv nights I've attended, which are characterised by their inclusive spirit. The compere's interactions with the audience felt more like the work of a stand-up, and carried with them some of the more adversarial spirit of that style. That's a risky way to start an improv night.

I'm not sure if the mystery made sense but, to be honest, with a show that inspired that much laughter, I didn't terribly care. Fundamentally this is a fun, interestingly formatted show in a suitably seedy space (a backroom dance floor) that provided a good night out.