Jan Jack’s Laughter House
The Red Lion Hotel, Basingstoke

A MUTUAL level of heckling between comic and crowd characterised the gags at Jan Jack’s latest Laughter House.

Dating, edgy jokes and a smattering of one-liners made for another entertaining evening at the Basingstoke comedy night, which kicked off with regular compere Danny Dawes.

A clear sign of how important the audience is at these nights was Dawes’ announcement to great applause that a pair of Laughter House regulars – whose relationship has evidently been the butt of jokes over the past months – are engaged.

The evening’s main victims, however, were another bride-to-be – who was a compere’s dream after revealing her imminent marriage to a significantly younger man in a lighthouse, offering up more potential jokes than Dawes had time to tell – and a group of plumbers who were sitting in the compere’s eyeline. Brave men!

First up on the bill was Nathan Caton, Chortle Student Comic of the Year 2005 and star of Paramount’s Nathan Caton Show.

Though a tender 24-year-old, he reminisced about the days when adolescents made “your mum” jibes – “you’re mum’s so short in her passport photo you can see her feet” – instead of pulling knives on each other, and declared that these days, with Obama as president, ginger people are the new victims of racism who can only dream of getting their own president one day.

After a great set, including insights into inter-racial dating and the faux pas of swearing in front of your grandmother, Jan Jack (right) took the mic for what seemed quite a short, but entertaining, set. She was sufficiently below-the-belt to live up to expectations.

Bringing the comedy back to the area, she observed that even the birds in Oakley use satnav to find their bird boxes.

The Irish Grainne McGuire had a chummy style and ironic wit, and created wonderful image of Emily Bronte writing letters in praise of people she hated when she was drunk.

A portly Dave Ward, Comedy Store and Jongleurs regular, had the headline spot with a number of one-liners and good crowd interaction, although – he admitted – only to lead in to his own jokes.

These included relationship jokes, a rant against public displays of affection and more besides in an amusing final set.

A fine way to spend a Thursday night, and the next one is up on July 9.

More information about that night can be found at laughter-house.co.uk.