As if stand-up comedy wasn’t nerve-wracking enough, you can always count on your average street heckler to disrupt the process just a little bit more.

Joshua Ross knows. He was outside practising his lines moments before his 10-minute skit at Oxford Glee Club on Saturday when a passerby interrupted and called him Specky.

Based on the personality he shows off on stage, it doesn’t seem entirely unlikely that Mr Ross – who indeed wears glasses – may have been subjected to the same kind of teasing in middle school. His delivery is as deadpan and acerbic as MTV’s Daria, the misanthropic cartoon teenager who rose to fame in the late 1990s.

His writing shines through when he makes fun of himself.

Recounting his unlucky love life, he said: “I am like crack because, for most, I am easy to resist but, for a select few, I can ruin lives.”

His purposefully awkward, anxiety-laden style contrasted sharply with the raucous delivery of Ireland’s Johnny Candon, who hosted the show in addition to his own sketches and shook up the audience in the process. “You’re not 26,” he told a woman near the front row. “Who’s your favourite Pokemon?”

Adam Rowe, a 23-year-old from Liverpool (and proud to be) who left his job at a bar to become a full-time comedian three years ago, showed how vulnerability can do wonders for a comedian. He started off on a dangerous path, mocking a group of girls he overheard daydreaming about celebrities and implying they weren’t pretty enough for them. He redeemed himself by making fun of many aspects of his life – be it a breakup, dysfunctional relationship with exercise or lazy eye.

Former geography teacher Luke Toulson took an irreverent take on parental humour by poking fun at his own abilities as a father, denouncing the boringness of school plays, and unapologetically admitting to playing favourites.

The night ended with Nish Kumar, whose performance was at times too clever for its own good and at times just the right amount of wit, like when he imagined what left-wing action films and right-wing folk songs would look and sound like – and gave the audience a bit of food for thoughts for the way home.

CLEMENCE MICHALLON 4/5