The Last Laugh

Feature from 2025

For anyone not familiar with the short film The Last Laugh (winner of many awards), then I would suggest tracking it down, grabbing a drink of whatever takes your fancy, and watching a superb piece of history.

The short was released in 2017, written and directed by Paul Hendy, and staring three wonderful actors, Bob Golding, Simon Cartwrite and Damien Williams.

The film covers an event that never happened, but instead asks the question, What if… and in this case the What If is What if Bob Monkhouse, Tommy Cooper and Eric Morecambe shared a dressing room.

It goes beyond that premise though and extends it to add just before their final performance.

When I heard the same team would be taking the play out on tour in an extended version, I was excited to see how it would turn out and how different it would be from the film. After all, the film ran in at 20 minutes, whereas the play would be over 1 hour.

I got a chance to see it at Manchester in August 2025, and have to say, it was fantastic, funny, surprising, at times poignant, superbly well written and excellently performed.

Bob Golding has played Eric before. His one-man touring show Morecambe was a huge success, and he is himself a massive fan. His has studied the man, got to know how he moves, speaks and thinks.

Simon Cartwrite has met Bob Monkhouse when he appeared on Opportunity Knocks in 1989, hosted by Bob, and had the audacity to do impressions of him. Bob took him aside and talked him through his impression and offered advice on how he would deliver a joke in his own style. He has been a fan ever since and knows his subject inside out.

Damian Williams has all it when it comes to being Tommy Cooper. He looks like him, sounds like him, has the sharp wit and every tiny look, stare and eye-roll timed to perfection. He too has played his subject before in the touring production Being Tommy Cooper.

The three of them arrive, one by one, into the dank dressing room of an un-named theatre. The banter starts even before all of them are on stage, with Bob and Tommy swapping jokes and insults. When Eric arrives, it just gets better.

Each character is so brilliantly observed, for that all too brief time, you are taken into that world. You are watching Tommy, Bob and Eric, relaxing, joking and swapping stories. The nostalgia is overwhelming and humour matches the period so well.

There are moments of quiet recollection though, as each relives their worst days, but it soon snaps back to the humour in the vastly different and yet compatible styles of each character.

They muse about how each would tell the same joke, how they would sell it, how they would talk and what actions they would do to accompany it. Each perfectly aligned with the characters.

Although I don`t want to spoil it for anyone who has not had the chance to see it, the scene with the gate was brilliant, and the on-going gag about a house number is delightful and plays perfectly into the comedic styles of each.

As the show moves on it becomes evident that Tommy thinks he is at Her Majesty`s Theatre. Anyone who knows the history will recognise that as the place he sadly lost his life in front of a live TV audience.

Eric thinks he is at The Roses Theatre Tewksbury, again where he did is last performance.

I will leave it there, again not wanting to throw in spoilers.

All the way through there are nobs to each character`s memorable routines. With Tommy it`s the duck and card trick or the glass bottle, bottle glass. With Eric it`s the line about all the right notes and the paper bag, and Bob just keeps firing gags, correcting the others about who wrote them and holding his famous leather bound joke books.

It is all relevant, all accurate and all brilliantly mixed together.

It was clear that they all get on, and the post show Q&A cemented that, with all of them joking and swapping anecdotes.

A truly brilliant world of pure escapism into the lives of three iconic comedians.



© morecambeandwise.com 2025