Review - Good Evening: The Sketches of Peter Cook and Dudley Moore

You have to be careful how you play – it’s always fun until somebody gets hurt. It’s the same with the classics. So it was when Pink sang the lines “Is this the real life, is this just fantasy?” at her recent concert. My wife held her breath, waiting for my reaction as Pink launched into a song I regard as sacrosanct. Would it be a tribute or an insult to the classic material?

Similar conflicting thoughts arose when I heard that Sean Micallef and Stephen Curry were to work with the classic sketches of Peter Cook and Dudley Moore. You need to be careful using the word “classic”, but few could argue that much of the work of Cook and Moore is high quality, beautifully crafted and timeless. Like the work of Spike Milligan, the cleverness of the wordplay can amuse today just as much as it did when it was written.

In talking of the classic material of Cook and Moore, it is important to note that “Good Evening” does not include any of their “Derek and Clive” oeuvre, and probably rightly so. For one, as much as I love the material (sorry Mum!), it would be unlikely to be able to be successfully recreated given the circumstances of its creation, and secondly, it is not befitting of a venue of the class of the Sydney Opera House.

So the raw material in terms of quality writing was there, the challenge was for Micallef and Curry to deliver to a similar level. They had made it clear in their promotion of the show that it would not be imitation of Cook and Moore, but rather an interpretation of the material showing respect as a tribute to its creators. Micallef and Curry are not strangers to the Australian public, so there is no need to refer to their credentials, but I was interested to see how Micallef would perform as personally I sometimes find that his amusement at the world seems to verge on condescension.

I thought that they were both brilliant. They were clearly enjoying working together, but never to the point where the act became self-indulgent. Curry has a fantastic sense of comic timing and seems to be delighted to be involved in a venture in which he is having so much fun. Micallef was brilliant, showing great control and clearly a great passion for the work of Peter Cook in particular. He played his role to perfection, never overplaying the acting (except in a couple of deliberate incidences where the material gave sufficient leeway). Whilst they were not intending to imitate, Micallef was eerily reminiscent of Cook on a couple of occasions, most notably in the “minicab” and the “critics” sketches.

The ensemble was completed with a very talented pianist, Mark Jones, who may have only been there “because Stephen can’t play piano”, but was a great asset to the show, complementing Micallef and Curry but also executing his time in the spotlight with great aplomb.

Highlights for me were the aforementioned “minicab” and “critics” sketches, as well as the “Good Evening” interviews and Mr Spiggott’s audition for the role of Tarzan. If you don’t know any or all of the sketches, avoid the temptation to Google them – go along to the show and delight in the delivery of two highly-talented comedians who clearly have great respect for the classics. Just in case you were wondering, so does Pink. She nailed Bohemian Rhapsody and did Freddie’s memory proud.

As I left the Opera House, this bloke came up to me…



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