Dara O'Briain: Live (MICF)

It's often observed that once a comic earns the majority of their notoriety from television work, their live stand-up ends up being different (to say the very least) to what an audience may be expecting.

Take for example the unanimously bad reviews of Tracy Morgan's tour of a couple years ago, or the shock-factor of Whose Line's Greg Proops, totally absent from his TV-friendly improv. Appearing on TV is a feather in the cap for any comedian and a chance to expose a facet of their personality that may not be so apparent elsewhere, but it comes at a cost. Comics entering the big leagues of onscreen fame often have to turn their back on the grubbier areas of their schtick, sanitised to appease swear-averse telly producers.

Dara O'Briain definitely does not do this.

While the host of Mock The Week throws in a few more swears than his telly fans may be accustomed to (which feel so natural when delivered in his Gaelic lilt), the Dublin-born comic is as genuine on stage as he is everywhere else. The 16-year hiatus since his last Aussie appearance has clearly not gone unnoticed to his Hamer Hall crowd, who immediately explode into wild applause at the mere mention of his name over the speakers. O'Briain emerges, the crowd doubles in volume, and the comic is ready with the beaming energy with which he is synonymous.

While it's often tiresome to hear an international guest wax lyrical on local cultural references, O'Briain is the cream of the crop when it comes to talking koalas and our round robin of PMs. His mile a minute pace is matched only by his own quick-wit, adding off-the-cuff bits to his own material which, whether premeditated or not, seems astoundingly natural for O'Briain.

If there is any doubt of his spontaneous inventiveness, his venture into crowd work immediately puts this to rest. Tonight, he's somehow hit the jackpot with his audience: the most morbid couple in the country (a grave digger and a debt collector), a producer of female-friendly pornography, a former comedy reviewer-cum-accountant, and a tour guide at a tram museum that only has four trams. O'Briain champs at the bit for this menagerie of professions, and somehow his material is still unfathomably organic, as if he had planted these people in the audience himself. His pure conversational style is perfect for this sort of humour; and even as he runs himself over time with the participation, the crowd beg for more.

O'Briain's material on social class disparities and ridiculous male sex fantasies is thought-provoking while avoiding confrontation. His tone and approach to the more unsavoury moments in life manages to find the funny without being disrespectful to the content or the people involved. Managing to find the most harrowing stories of death his audience could possibly muster, O'Briain maintains his grin throughout and grants permission for laughs.

Of course, the nerd in O'Briain (he's an accomplished academic with a degree in Maths) can't stay hidden forever, and soon enough the show takes a hilarious educational turn. Nowhere else will there be a stand-up show featuring the phrases "vector on vector", "fluid spectrum", "Phineas Gage", "oxytocins", and "simian research laboratory". It's all part of the wide net that O'Briain casts out for his fans; giving all of himself and offering something for everyone as a result.

It is a damn shame that this review cannot lead to more punters going to see this show. With just one more performance in Melbourne that will almost certainly sell out, O'Briain has well and truly accumulated a diehard fanbase that will come out in drones for the masterful comedian. To see this kind of broad, all-encompassing showcase of O'Briain's greatest hits is a privilege and an unadulterated joy. Even if his next journey to Aus is another decade and a half away, O'Briain will once again be welcomed like a king.

Dara O'Briain Live plays till 5 Apr at Hamer Hall, part of the Melbourne International Comedy Festival, and 8 April at Perth Convention & Exhibition Centre.