Direct from a sell-out run at Edinburgh Fringe Festival, The Last Laugh is a brand-new laugh-a-minute play which re-imagines the lives of three of Britain's all-time greatest comedy heroes – Tommy Cooper, Eric Morecambe and Bob Monkhouse.
Filled with great gags and touching stories, The Last Laugh is nostalgic and poignant and guaranteed to be London’s best comedy night out.
The Last Laugh is written and directed by the award-winning Paul Hendy, and stars Bob Golding as Morecambe, Simon Cartwright as Monkhouse and Damian Williams as Cooper.
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Captioned, 15 March, 2:30pm
It’s refreshing to see how well Cooper, Monkhouse and Morecambe get on, rather than the antagonism bordering on cliché that we tend to get in bio-dramas about comedians in theatre or film. Hendy has them gently ribbing each other – particularly about Monkhouse’s big book of carefully pre-prepared jokes – but affectionately, and out of love for what they do. And we get a lot about the history of British comedy through the trio’s reminiscences about who they’ve worked with and admired. It’s often pretty illuminating, even if Hendy plays it safe by steering clear of really addressing the sexism, homophobia and racism underlying the period on which he’s focused.
The script doesn’t dig deep, but still cuts below the surface, broaching what lasts, and what doesn’t, and the way we must all take our final bow. Golding’s contribution perhaps risks the greatest disappointment, given how adored Morecambe was, but even if he trades on a roster of familiar mannerisms – the raised eyebrows and forced chuckles, that pipe-puffing insouciance – he beautifully catches the essence of the star. And when he takes to a chair to strum and sing With My Little Stick of Blackpool Rock, we ascend to a cloud nine where being innocuously daft is all. If we’re left wanting more, maybe that’s the point.
| 2025 | West End |
West End |
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