Depending on which paragraph you’re reading in the BBC story, 3,600 British comedy fans paid £45 or £50 to see Sarah Silverman “show people what all the fuss in America is about her.”

When she ditched at 40 minutes, folks got upset. Very upset. They dragged her out onto the stage for a Q & A session, “as an encore after admitting she had no other material prepared.”

BBC Radio 1 reporter Kev Geoghegan said, “she could’ve done more – she should have been able to fill for another 20 minutes.” Well, apparently she couldn’t.

But why, exactly, does a comedian (a comedian who is starring in a Comedy Central series) travel across the ocean to England, charge the equivalent of nearly $85 and arrive prepared to do only 40 minutes? Why didn’t she buy material?!

How about she produce The Sarah Silverman Multi-Media Extravaganza, with short clips from the series and a special guest?

Turns out she did just that.

According to the Times of London though, “her support act, Steve Agee, fell ill” and the show was preceded by five minutes of clips from her Comedy Central series. (And, again according to the Times, she did 50 not 40. Doesn’t anyone in England own a watch?)

This much is true: The crowd was ready to string her up when she came out for the “encore.”

Perhaps the most interesting quote from Dominic Maxwell, the author of the review, is this:

Silverman is sort of herself, sort of a character. And after a while you want something genuine. You want to know what she really thinks, not what she thinks she can get away with. Without more of a moral backdrop, all this saying the unsayable can play as facetiousness sent to college.

She knows the limitations of her arrogant-ignorant persona. But she’s not used to having to explain herself. As she stalked the stage, appearing to resent her crowd for wanting more, it was the eggiest end to a comedy show I’ve ever seen. Edging back to the wings with a mock-grandiose bow, it was the usual petulance but without the usual inverted commas. She blew it.

Emphasis ours.

If we understand Maxwell correctly, it’s all jolly good fun to laugh at Sarah (or Sarah’s character) when she does her racist and bigoted material. But, now that we have reason not to like her (She did a short set!), we would like her to explain herself and assure us that she is not truly racist and bigoted. And, in so doing, she can assure us that we, her fans, are not truly racist and bigoted.

This has been creeping up on her for some time now. In May of last year, when Silverman was interviewed by Maxim, we posted Sarah Silverman feeling the P.C. heat? in which we warned that the folks who support Silverman are thisclose to declaring her “dangerous.”

Up until now, it was a given that her act was a conceit, that she was shining the light of truth on racism and ugliness. Because, up until now, it was assumed that her intentions were good. But she does one short show at the Soho and folks are ready to get out the P.C. pitchforks and light the torches. What does she really think? Where’s the “moral backdrop?” Isn’t it time she “explained herself?” The fallout might be interesting.