To say this was to be an educational visit would be a bit of a lie, as we prepared ourselves for Steve-O’s (part of the infamous Jackass team) promise that there would be some ‘crazy ass sh*t going on tonight!’.

With the crowd, made up mostly of gothic girls and the tattooed fraternity, growing ever more restless as the show’s start time came and went, we were treated to endless soft rock songs that the crowd really didn’t want to hear.

Our source of fun though came from a man, clearly 20 years too old to be there wearing a hoody and clutching his disposable camera for all his worth, and was being squashed a bit by the people behind him and pushing him to the point of tears.

 When Steve-O finally did appear on stage, the audience went into an excited frenzy, chanting his name as if the God of all things Mighty had walked onstage, and the atmosphere was undeniably electric, with the Academy serving as a perfect venue for this kind of show. 

To further this excitable crowd, his first stunt was straight out of ‘how to make the crowd feel sick’ book of tricks – and it involved, tequila, a lot of salt, lime, and a towel to mop up the vomit.

 Steve-O and special guests Ryan Dunn both ate a mound of salt off of their hands, downed a ridiculous amount of tequila, added a few limes for good measure, then proceeded to throw up onstage for the next minute or so – hilarious…and slightly disgusting! But it got the crowd’s blood pressure going, and so the stunts continued.

 Impressively though, to make his father proud, he proceeded to balance a stepladder on his chin, and then a butchers knife on his nose.  But his most cringe worthy stunt was to ‘prove that glass is sharp when its broken’. To do this, he firstly had a light bulb smashed over his head – but then continued to slice his tongue open over and over again, then spit the blood down his manly chest

 Including clips from Jackass and his own new video (self indulgent?) we were treated to shots of his tour manager going toilet but...well to put it nicely..missing, his brother skateboarding inside the house (I bet his mum didn’t let him do that when he was a boy!) and various people jumping onto a table and breaking it.

 I don’t know if this makes me sound like an old fart, but as the show went on into the night, I just felt bored.  After the initial shock of seeing gross stuff up close, I couldn’t help but feel that there was just more of the same to come.

And I was right.

 Admittedly, his audience participation was superb – bringing out an especially troublesome crowd member onstage on a number of occasions, firstly to have his lovely lady assistants each kick him square in the nuts, and then to include him (with 3 other audience members) in the ‘punch yourself in the face until you bleed’ game – which a rather frightening man called Tom won; and then refused to leave the stage until Steve-O or Ryan had caused him more pain.  Eventually, Ryan held him in a choke-hold and knocked him unconscious within 10 seconds… and much fun was had by all.

 His finale, stapling his scrotum to his leg, was indeed disgusting and should definitely not be tried at home – but I feel that a vast majority of the crowd would do just that when they got back to their abodes.

 I’m actually a big fan of the T.V show, and it is on this medium that I feel this kind of stuff works a lot better.  For many parts of the show, it simply felt like none of the people on stage knew what to do next – so in turn, left me twiddling my thumbs until the next stunt took place.

 I’m sure that we’ve all seen Jackass on TV and thought briefly that it’d be cool to try out some ‘crazy ass sh*t of your own – but most of us abandon that thought when we change channels.  Yet this live show is more for hardcore fans, who probably DO try most of what they see at home.

 There’s no denying that Steve-O is a master at what he does, and his stage show truly does bring to life the bizarre happenings from Jackass and CKY, the only difference being that you can turn Jackass off.

 Had I had to pay the £15 entry, I would have been disappointed, but I’m pretty sure 95% of the crowd would disagree (and probably kill and eat me for saying so) which is why the stage show is really for Jackass Wannabies who thoroughly enjoyed and loved seeing their idol live, onstage, and in pain.

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