Tony Lidington continues to enthral with his echoes of the entertainers of long ago.
Here he takes on the guise of Dan Leno, the most influential of all the music hall greats. Not a tribute show this and not a meticulous Leno impersonation. Though in certain poses and expressions Lidington, with the tousled hair and the eyebrow make-up, does look remarkably like Leno.
Lidington’s regard, respect and admiration for Leno is palpable, indeed his championing of the subjects of every one of his biographical shows has these qualities. His performances are instructive without seeming to teach or to preach. They entertain. They bring pulsating - warts and all - life to a name on a fading playbill.
Thanks to Lidington the thread of Leno’s influence can be traced through to the comedians of our grandparents’ generation and up to the present day. Lidington shakes the dust from Leno’s comic songs and patter. He stresses Leno’s desire for respectability and his mistrust of committing his talent to the newfangled vogue for recording. The man’s failing emotional state (the show is staged in a mental institute), could do with some attention.
No one who sees this impressively staged entertainment will forgot the manner of its closing. Lidington steps back from a phonograph which is playing Leno singing his famous Hard Boiled Egg ditty. A small clockwork Leno figure is on the machine. Crackling recordings are all that is left of him.
Lidington has done Leno’s memory a great service.
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