Milling around the bar before the show, I thought the guy with the long sweeping hair was about to get thrown out for being under age. Ed Byrne looks about 12.
How can someone so youthful know enough about the world and all its quirks to stand before a packed audience of expectant expats - well, mostly expats - and make them laugh. Byrne's from Dublin. Enough said.
He's actually 28, so he says, and already has a list of comic credentials as long as his Oscar Wilde-style cloak, regularly selling out his spots at the Edinburgh Festival, appearing with all the usual suspects of the comedy circuit in Britain, and now around the world, and has even made a feature film.
Byrne is a pro, and has the perfect act for the Punchline audience - puffing on cigarettes, swigging cans of beer, and swearing his way through a polished set that allows him to project his ironic take on life, perhaps as only the Irish see it.
He's the charming young rascal whose girlfriends' mothers warn their daughters about, but who would love to be going on the date themselves. It's not just what he says, but the way he says it - he almost insists you laugh, and you do.
And can he talk. It felt like he had enough material to carry on through the three-night stint without a break, not just a well-earned encore.