Funny guys, but cut the singing

Freeman Show '98 Lyric Theatre, Academy for Performing Arts COMING up with almost three hours of gags and jokes is no laughing matter. If only for having the bravery to try, Dayo Wong Tsz-wah, Francis Ng Chun-yu and Cheung Tat-ming deserve kudos for their Freeman Show '98.

They still have to learn that many stand-up comedians tend to opt for either 45-minute or one-hour sets. That means that if the script is decent, jokes will hit the bull's-eye and not fly over the audience's heads.

The charge Wong, Ng and Cheung have to plead guilty to is that they try to follow too many trails and tell too many stories.

Their own life histories, for instance, might be perfect for a late-night chat show but went on much too long here. In the end, the audience was sometimes left fumbling in its wake because the punch-lines were too long coming.

With about 30 minutes chopped off, the show would be more succinct and effective. As it was, they sometimes lost their audience by rambling or, mind-bogglingly enough, breaking into song.

The Freeman Show was always an ambitious project. Its initial 25-show run was unheard of for stand-up comedy acts - even at the 1,000-plus seater Lyric Theatre. To now extend it by another 19 shows is testament indeed to its three comedians' talent, although one would not consider their singing a particularly strong trait.

In their meandering way, the three comedians do manage to achieve their aim to subtly let the audience in on what they see as a man's world and how it relates to women and everyone else.