The last time Funtime Frankie, the moniker Frank Skinner used for himself on his ITV chat show, brought comedy treats to the West End it was under the guise of the Credit Crunch Cabaret at the Lyric. Shaftesbury Avenue, in 2009.
Wisely eschewing the theme of an ever-growing recession for this season, Skinner’s titular friends are a mix of new talent and old hands.
Resplendent in evening wear, Skinner carried out his hosting duties with a stately aplomb, a state belying some of his coarser material on, for example, sex in public. If that wasn’t to everyone’s taste, few could deny him his theory that if a man faked an orgasm in the public way Meg Ryan did it would not be as well-received.
Skinner’s cheek was juxtaposed tonight by the quiet charm of Elis James, the upbeat laddism of Simon Brodkin’s character Lee Nelson, the high-octane antics of Phil Nichol and the bewildering beatbox skills of Beardyman.
James mixed simple observations with carefully woven tales, Lee Nelson, conversely, is all about brash audience work and chav stereotypes. Nichol’s energetic set included a song about offending people called You Can’t Say That to Me, where a “deaf bi-Asian teenage albino” laid claim to being excused from even the slightest of slights. Finally Beardyman impressed with his soundscaping skills finding new, cartoonish echoes to Nina Simone’s Feeling Good.
This quartet provided a great deal of energy in the room but it was the sly stylings of Skinner that prevailed.
Production information can change over the run of the show.
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