The Virginia Divine Show

Bewley's Cafe Theatre, Dublin

Sincerity is the soul of a good performance. If you can fake that, then you're laughing. While this jazz cabaret featured some stellar music and beautiful singing, it suffered from a compΦre whose performance smothered every number in irony and, in doing so, threatened to overturn her good work.

Virginia Divine, the alter ego of Maria Tecce, is a motor-mouthed "noo yawker" with a line in flippant remarks, throwaway sentiments and jazz scat. A railway track, laid on the small stage, seemed an impediment, as Divine traversed the steel beam. It turned out that the real obstacle to our enjoyment was the ironic shield of La Divine, as she introduced each song with a deflating and derailing remark.

Taken without the chutzpah, the music was earnest, smouldering and sensual. Fred Astaire's The Way You Look Tonight was neatly dressed in a gentle jazz that allowed for intricate improvisations from Phil Ware's piano and Dave Redmond's tensely rhythmic upright bass. Benny Goodman's Love Me Or Leave Me unwound with tiptoe bass and showed that Tecce's vocals can be unselfconscious and affecting when she wants them to be.

But when titters broke out during her hammy solemnity during Aretha Franklin's Today I Sing The Blues, I felt embarrassed to lose myself in Ware's simmering piano solo. If Tecce won't commit to these songs, then why should we? It's a shame. I would have far preferred to see the Maria Tecce show.

Runs each Friday until August 30th