Lou Sanders, Soho Theatre review - shame put under the spotlight

★★★★ LOU SANDERS, SOHO THEATRE Shame put under the spotlight

Raw honesty, red faces

Have you ever felt the hot shame of saying or doing the wrong thing? Not just embarrassment – that's for amateurs, says Lou Sanders in her wonderfully honest and revealing show Shame Pig, in which she essays some of her life's red-faced moments. Embarrassment is fleeting and lends itself to a good anecdote (or a fine joke in a stand-up set), she says, while shame is a much more corrosive emotion, and one that young women in particular burden themselves with unnecessarily.

Daniel Sloss, Leicester Square Theatre review - toxic masculinity examined

Male attitudes in the #MeToo age

Daniel Sloss's latest show is called X, to denote his 10th show. The Scottish comic started in comedy as a teenager in 2009 when a lot of his material was knob and wank gags, but in recent years his work has had a progressively edgier feel, including shows that delved into his sister's death from cerebral palsy and the childhood grooming from which he had a lucky escape.

James Acaster, Phoenix Theatre review - a masterclass in comedy

★★★★★ JAMES ACASTER, PHOENIX CINEMA A masterclass in comedy

The stand-up's show is his most personal yet

There's a story in James Acaster's superb new show at the Phoenix Theatre which hangs on him being the first UK comic to shoot several Netflix specials. He doesn't tells us this to boast; far from it. It's to set up another long-form gag, one of several lengthy and interconnected stories he tells in Cold Lasagne Hate Myself 1999, the two-part tale of the best and worst years of his life.

Leicester Comedy Festival Gala Preview Show review - an entertaining mixed bag

★★★ LEICESTER COMEDY FESTIVAL GALA PREVIEW An entertaining mixed bag

Curtain-raiser to next month's offerings

Suited and booted, Tom Allen and Suzi Ruffell presented this gala preview to the Leicester Comedy Festival, which is now in its 26th year and starts next month. The comics, who do an occasional podcast together called Like Minded, make an engaging double act – although their solo shows couldn't be more different.

Hari Kondabolu, Soho Theatre review - from politics to papayas

★★★★ HARI KONDABOLU, SOHO THEATRE From politics to papayas

US comic with an original take on all manner of things

As openings go, the first night of Hari Kondabolu's standup residency at Soho Theatre was pretty memorable, so get to American Hour in good time as he is trying to pull off the same trick when he can (no spoilers, but it involves quite a bit of planning for each performance, so he may not). It's a clever spoof on the “all Asians look the same to me” trope so beloved of white racists.

Dave Gorman, Royal Festival Hall review - PowerPoint king is back with bite

★★★★ DAVE GORMAN, RFH PowerPoint king is back with bite

Fake news, domestic harmony and daytime TV

Anyone who has seen a previous Dave Gorman show or his television series Modern Life Is Goodish knows what to expect: a show that's part lecture, part conversation, all pedantry, done with the aid of a PowerPoint presentation – clicker, laptop and onstage big screen as important as the patter, the text on screen often providing an addendum gag to the one he has already told, or increasing our anticipation of a payoff yet to come.

Ayesha Hazarika, Soho Theatre review - feminism examined

★★★ AYESHA HAZARIKA, SOHO THEATRE Fascinating and often funny take on feminism

Fascinating and often funny take on the subject

As a former adviser to Harriet Harman and Ed Miliband – and a woman who has put her name forward to be a Labour Party candidate at a Westminster election – Ayesha Hazarika certainly knows her politics from the inside. So a show with the title Girl on Girl: The Fight For Feminism promises to be avowedly political.

Ivo Graham, Soho Theatre review - the perils of growing up

Going deep into personal material unearths lots of laughs

Considering where Motion Sickness ends up, Ivo Graham's new show begins a million miles away, as he talks about his love of trains and his favourite train company, Chiltern – or “The Chilt”. But don't be fooled by this quotidian fare; what begins as a seemingly aimless wander down a path of nothing very much packs an emotional punch by the end of the hour.