It is both pleasing and intriguing when a distinctive comedian that you have liked for years suddenly starts to gain wider acceptance. This has definitely happened to Tony Law since he was nominated for a Foster's Award in 2012. Pleasing because he is brilliant, intriguing because there was a time when I thought that Law was way too left field for television with his surreal riffs and 1908 Arctic explorer chic. But it has all fallen into place and he seems to be perfectly at home next to Noel Fielding on Never Mind The Buzzcocks. In fact he could probably stand in for Fielding as their humour drinks from the same offbeat well. Law comes to Soho Theatre for a lengthy run with his latest show, Nonsense Overdrive, from Tuesday. If you've already tried to get tickets and were unlucky try again - the run has just been extended until January 11.
If you like your comedy more conventional there are two great options this week. Bill Burr arrives in the UK trailing plaudits behind him like a string of rattling tin cans. The Bostonian has done the usual round of chat shows in America, he's a hard-working club comedian, he appeared in Breaking Bad as Saul Goodman's henchman Patrick Kuby. What more could you want? Oh, and he's also been acclaimed by Rolling Stone as the new Louis CK. That's a bit much, perhaps, but he is still damn sharp when finding the funny in life's little irritations. You can read our interview with Burr here.
The other big visitor this week is Trevor Noah. The quietly charismatic South African first a made splash over here a couple of years ago when he was championed by Eddie Izzard. Things are really taking off for Noah now. He has a sitcom in development in America based on his life which is being produced by Will Smith's production company.
The sitcom will certainly have an interesting back story - Noah grew up under apartheid with a white Swiss father and a black mother. His mother had to pretend she was the maid when she took him out for walks. The show is not all about gritty politics though. There are also some great stories about Noah's experiences of travelling round the world, which may well work their way into the TV version too. Noah brings a super-sized update of his autobiographial touring show, The Racist, to London this week and it is selling so well another date has just been added in January.
