I was a Lee Evans virgin till Tuesday. I understood the hype and the magnitude, I’d clocked how enorm-ously appealing and popular this man is and how global, I’d watched his Hollywood films and registered how his rubbery body and elastic face were all part of the act. So why had I resisted? His mass appeal perhaps, his arena size audiences, the sell-out ticket system . . . but I’d been missing out. Nothing had prepared me for how funny he was.

After the first half of his show my face was wet with tears and by the end I could scarcely move. I started snorting when he moved on to his marriage, finally giving up all modicum of dignity as I gulped and yelped my way to the finale, tears running down my face.

It wasn’t all brilliant, mind you, but it wasn’t meant to be. The clue was in the title, Lee Evans — A Work In Progress. He was warming up for his arena tour and this was a practice. He was using us as guinea pigs, reading from notes to see whether we laughed or not, scrunching them up when we didn’t and adding: “I know where that one’s going when I get home”, or “I’ll be cutting that one Oxford,” when it got a bit racy.

Anyone who thinks that comedians just rock up to the theatre and crack jokes should witness how hard they work to produce the finished article. They may be funny, but standing up for two hours and making us laugh takes enormous dedication.

Not that there was a theme. His topics are as random as he is, veering between the classic comedian’s trap of talking about trains, buses, planes and hotel rooms, because that’s where they spend most of their time, to his favourite animals and why, and acting out the contents of the washing machine.

But it wasn’t until the very end, when he veered off into the realms of his 30-year marriage and how age was affecting him, that I had to start holding my sides. So close to the bone, I was often wincing through my tears, he was absolutely spot on, bringing to life all the habits, absurdities and realities of marriage in an unrelenting fashion.

So if you get the chance to go and see him, do. But until then I would heartily advise catching the work in motion because it’s far more intimate and real than the polished product and for that we were eternally grateful.