This review is from the 2024 Edinburgh Festival Fringe.
The big word-of-mouth comedy hit at the 2024 Fringe is this outlandish yet perversely enjoyable late night gem from newcomer Huddersfield comic Joe Kent-Waters.
Kind of like the degenerate, basement-raised offspring of ‘Phoenix Nights’ and ‘League of Gentlemen’ - not to mention Marlowe’s ‘Doctor Faustus’ - the nominal premise is that 24 years ago, Rotherham working men’s club owner Frankie made a pact with infernal powers: they offered him a wish and he asked that they preserve his club exactly how it was - immune to the outside world - until such time as they would return to drag him into hell.
I would say that one hundred percent explains what happens in this show, but that’s kind of beside the point. Lumbering on in thick white face makeup that dissolves throughout the sweaty set, Monroe seems part infernal himself. Acting as emcee, he presides over a series of bizarre games, guest acts (all played by Kent-Waters) and audience interactions that do not in any way feel like they would have seemed current in the late ‘90s, or probably the early ’70s.
I was, er, delighted to find myself the participant in one of the interactions: early on Kent-Waters/Frankie – who is a pretty big lad it has to be said – demanded I hand over my wallet. Throughout the remainder of the night I was given a series of absurd, rigged opportunities to win it back – like guessing which marigold glove was filled with scampi fries. That sort of...
Comedy tribute acts are all the rage these days. First Kenneth Williams, then Eric and Ern. Now it’s the turn of another UK comedy giant, Tommy Cooper, to get the ‘Stars in Their Eyes’ treatment – in this slight but thoroughly likeable show that comes with the approval of the Cooper estate.
At 6' 4", Cooper was a comedy giant in more ways than one. His lumbering frame and granite features (captured in John Claridge’s wonderful black-and-white photo portraits which stare down from the walls of the museum’s tiny performance space) were integral to his act, a perfect counterpoint to the childlike glee of his rapid-fire gags and artfully dysfunctional magic.
With that in mind, first impressions of the new Tommy Cooper – played by baby-faced 26-year-old John Hewer – are not great. However, with a tip of the fez here, a shrug of the shoulders there and, most importantly, excellent comic timing, the legendary Welsh comedian is slowly but surely resurrected, some 30 years after his death. It’s a fine, remarkably faithful performance from the talented Hewer.
So we get ‘spoon jar, jar spoon’, the farcical card tricks, the oddball props and that infectious cackle. At best it’s rather like a Harry Hill show: full of inspired lunacy and deep, belly laughs (in the case of the Cooper diehards in the audience, who know every word to these classic routines, laughter often escapes well before the punchlines). At worst it’s like suffering a string of rotten Christmas cracker jokes from an attention-seeking uncle.
Of course, this avalanche of jokes and magical flubs can be exhausting, and Hewer wisely employs musical interludes to add variety. Unfortunately, despite his obvious skill, pianist Christopher Peters simply performs a pair of lukewarm ditties in the Richard Stilgoe mould, complete with horribly dated Home Counties whimsy. It’s a poor fit and the only real misfire in an otherwise entertaining two hours.
One other thing to note: stick around for the interval, when you’ll be greeted by the awesome sight of a man slowly and solemnly letting the air out of an eight-foot inflatable giraffe, the remnants of some inspired shtick at the close of the first half. If that’s not reason enough to recommend a show, I don’t know what is.