Dudley Sutton - Killing Kittens

Underbelly

"HELLO, thanks so much for coming," purred the affable Mr Sutton as he greeted each member of his small, afternoon audience with a warm handshake.

Such courtesy is unusual on the Fringe but our Dud is a very unusual man indeed as he proceeded to prove over the course of the next hour.

Blessed (or possibly cursed) with the face of an elderly shitszu that’s particularly pleased with itself Sutton may still be recognisable to grannies round the country as loveable rogue Tinker from TV’s Lovejoy but this is one show that your grandmother probably wouldn’t appreciate. Unless, that is, shes got a particularly filthy sense of humour.

Taking its title from an age-old parental warning that every time you masturbate God kills a kitten (apparently not true, sadly) Sutton’s show could have easily been called Self Lovejoy.

If, however, the deity had however seen fit to cull a kitten every time someone pleasured themselves then Sutton could reasonably be indicted for feline genocide. Even at the sprightly age of 70 the lascivious Mr S is still obsessed with his "Jimmy" as he affectionately calls it and all the joy it has brought him over the years - which has been considerable apparently.

Beginning with a reminiscence of his very early childhood Dud regales us with tales of his formative years, all of which seem to revolve around his "spigot" and the manual manipulation thereof. So apparently total is Sutton’s recall of his infancy that it is surprising that he didn’t see fit to include a section concerning his experiences in his mother’s womb.

Practically anything seems to have aroused Sutton’s desire in his youth, from his big brother’s bottom (don’t ask) to marching in heavy woollen shorts, and he makes a halfway decent case for cradling your genitals as conducive to aiding the thought process.

"The ignorant refer to philosophers as wankers," he observes, "and they’re right!"

If this all sounds a bit tiresome - and it is rather - Dud’s obsessive recollections are thankfully interspersed with some of his fine comic poetry.

Perhaps predictably Sutton’s not so privates make guest appearances in all of his verse.

However, poems such as Lines Regarding The Effect Of DH Lawrence on The Granddaughter of an English Duke (where Sutton is spotted, yes, you guessed it and mistaken for Lady Chatterly’s Mellors) demonstrate a truly original and definitely eccentric comic sensibility at work.

At its best Sutton’s verse rivals that of Spike Milligan and John Hegley.

While it is probably rather ingenuous to criticise a show predicated on masturbation for being self-indulgent - what did you expect anyway? - this could have been considerably better if Sutton concentrated more on pleasing his audience rather than pleasuring himself.

Perhaps Dudley’s stern dad was right all along and onanism does rob you of your ambition.

• Runs until August 24