DUDLEY MOORE SCORED 1O AFTER HE GOT SHOT OF PETER COOK
Double rouble
As Mitchell and Webb’s debut feature film Magicians hits cinemas Eddie Harrison looks back on the chequered careers of British double acts at the movies
ou are two very funny. funny men. Your live
act is honed to perfection and your
catchphrases are shouted from every street corner. So what new worlds can a comic duo conquer'.’
l’eep Shore's Mitchell and Webb have come up with a very traditional answer: they are to star as variations of their best known characters in a feature film. Ilitting our cinemas next week. Magieians (pictured) features a duelling conjurors theme. which apes L'S hits The Prestige and The Illusionisi. But as the great (Morecamhe and Wise) and the vulgar (Adrian Iidmondson and Rik Mayall) have discovered. the road from two-man knockahout into celluloid gold is one festooned with the wreckage of previous disasters.
Take. if you will. the salutary example of Tommy (‘annon and Bobby Ball. With a regular television audience in the tens of millions. their cinematic dehut 7710 Boys in Blue updated the Will Ilay classic Ask a l’olieeinan. with our boys portraying hapless cops who uncover a sinister conspiracy behind the twitching net curtains of a sleepy Iinglish village. Ilistory records that The Boys in Blue emptied cinemas faster than a surprise fire drill. but at least their dehacle put them in illustrious company. For three consecutive years in the mid I‘)()()s the great .\'1orecamhe and Wise failed to translate national adulation into box office (or critical) favour with The Intelligenee Men. 'I‘lzai Riviera 'I'oue/i or The MagiIi/ieenl THY).
Nowadays. Ant and Dec may rule the ever-shrinking fiel'dom of commercial television. but no thanks to 2005‘s mishegotten Alien Autopsy. a sci—ii comedy which fell into the same league as Mel Smith and
(iriff Rhys Jones' appalling “)85 liasco Morons l‘i‘nill ()uler Spare.
Iiconomic realities have played as large a part as perl‘ormer’s vanity in the decline of British comedy. ()nce upon a time popular WWII comedy duo Bud Flanagan and (‘hesney Allen could amuse punters in cheap vaudeville quickies such as (iashags and li'e'l/ Smile Again.
But with the cost of filmmaking rising rapidly in the post war years. a flop comedy feature was no longer a laughing matter. Consequently. there were (perhaps thankfully) no cinematic outings for the Two Ronnies. Newman and Baddiel. Reeves and Mortimer. or even the cine—literate French and Saunders.
Jettisoning your partner initially provided one way of getting on the big screen: Dudley Moore scored ll) after he got shot of Peter Cook. while Stephen Iiry and Hugh Laurie were both forced to dump their arch gags to achieve individual fame.
That said the peaks of cinematic popularin are not insurmountahle. Duo of sorts Simon I’egg and .\'ick I’rost converted cult TV show S/iaeeil into box—office winners Shaun of the l)(’(l(/ and Hot l-'u::. the latter accumulating a cool £20 million in the l'K alone. Their fresh new idea'.’ Like (‘annon and Halls The Boys in Blue. Hot Fuzz features two hobbies who uncover a secret conspiracy hidden behind the respectable surface of a quaint Iinglish village.
(‘an the magic of the movies really be so random'.’ It’s just as well Mitchell and Webb can fall back on their day job. flogging technology.
Magicians is on general release from Fri 18 May.
Hit
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