Three Comedians walk into a room - The Last Laugh

The Last Laugh at The Noel Coward Theatre, London, from 25 February – 22 March

Review by David Court

The premise is simple – three comedians at the height of their popularity meet in a dressing room ahead of a performance, discussing their careers, the sacrifices they have made and the art of comedy itself. And it just so happens that these three comedians are Tommy Cooper, Bob Monkhouse, and Eric Morecambe.

In 2016 Paul Hendy wrote, directed, and produced The Last Laugh, the short twenty-minute film that served as the inspiration and source for the eighty-minute play. Filmed on location at The Ashcroft Theatre in Croydon (where all three comedy icons had performed in their careers), it was a poignant look at the lives of three men who made our own that much brighter, with stellar performances from three actors at the absolute top of their game.

The Last Laugh Cast - L to R: Damian Williams as Tommy Cooper, Bob Golding as Eric Morecambe, Simon Cartwright as Bob Monkhouse. Production photography by Pamela Raith.

It's those same actors that take to the stage for the play. We are first introduced to Damian Williams as Tommy Cooper, naked apart from pants, a vest and oversized chicken feet. He’s shortly joined by Simon Cartwright as Bob Monkhouse and then by Bob Golding as Eric Morecambe. An unkempt dressing room in the setting, all flickering lights and peeling paint – the room mirroring the physical condition of the three men inhabiting it.

All three performers are uncanny – Damian Williams steps into Cooper’s huge boots (and chicken feet) with seeming ease, a huge physical presence who can make a room laugh without doing anything. Golding’s Morecambe is equally as convincing (the actor had already played the comedic giant in a one-man show) but it’s Cartwright’s Monkhouse who steals the show – all tanned confidence and showmanship, elevating it beyond a mere (convincing) impression into something quite magical.

Much of the entertainment and drama in the play The Shark is Broken (a show about the making of Jaws) comes from the different personalities of three leads all effectively imprisoned together in a single location, and there’s a similar energy here. Here are three men coming together at the effective end of a comedy era, all forced to confront their own mortality, their troubled lives and the critical question that drives them on – what is comedy?

Cooper and Morecambe, it could be argued, had funny bones – their mere presence enough to generate laughter, but Monkhouse was a hugely different type of comedian – one who had to work tirelessly for a gag, crafting and fine-tuning every laugh.

We were concerned how a twenty-minute short (still available on YouTube and highly recommended) could be expanded to four times its length, but we needn’t have worried. If anything, the additional breathing space allows for more character development and conversations between three men that you could happily listen to all day.

There is a sad poignancy to the tale which will become apparent to anybody who knows anything about these three legends of comedy, but a great much of the tale is about legacy – and how these three men are remembered long after their passing.

I cannot recommend this play enough – with three incredible central performances and a wonderful central tale, it deserves all the praise it is rightfully receiving. Why review a London show that is approaching the end of its run, you might ask? Well, it is about to tour the UK and there are Birmingham dates between July 22 and 26, and I strongly encourage you to check it out – tickets are available here.