Day 1959: Dead Ringers

Monday

It is a new series of impressionist comedy from the DEAD RINGERS and this means that they have got to try out their new PARTY LEADERS.

It sometimes seems that the public pay more attention to comedians than they do to politicians: how many politicians catch phrases catch on? How many of those catch phrases are ACTUALLY comedians DOING the politicians? (Who remembers Mr Major saying "I'm still here!")

Mr Ian Hislop often says that Lady Thatcher was HELPED by the way comedians and cartoonists characterised her as STRONG or HARD or MANLY. It was only when they started to suggest that she was POTTY that they did her any damage.

Comedians often have to keep a closer eye on public mood than politicians because if they are out of touch they will not be FUNNY! And they will only be funny if there is an element elephant of TRUTH in what they say.

Mr Culshaw does a very good Lord Blairimort (this week sharing the bunker with Adolf Hitler and Lady Thatcher). "People of Britain… who hate me…" hurt expression; haunted eyes; Gordon's-stabbed-me-in-the-back shoulders…

Unfortunately their new leaders were, um, not so very good.

Sir Mr the Merciless was done as an old man sat in the corner waiting for the nurse to vacuum around him. I do not think we would have guessed it was him if he had not introduced himself. In fact, in many ways, it was their same portrayal as Mr CK1 Kennedy. Only in a CARDIGAN.

I think that this must be because Sir Mr the Merciless has not made a big enough impact with the public yet.

WE all know that he is rather less this and rather more this.

But he has clearly not done anything OUTRAGEOUS enough to stick in the public mind yet. Maybe he should use his RED LIGHTSABRE to decapitate ALISTAIR DARLING at question time. Or would nobody notice?

Mr Balloon was portrayed as a breathless PR man writing down on is flip board any policy that he was sent by people who phoned in just to have something to support. We could tell it was him because he was joined by Mr Culshaw as Mr William Vague.

This is probably rather MORE disappointing for Mr Balloon who has had a lot longer as leader than Sir Mr the Merciless, plus all the free publicity that shiny-headed Nick Mate-of-Dave Robinson could get him and STILL he doesn't seem to have made enough of an impact to have a proper caricature yet.

Because the Liberal Democrats depend quite a lot on the leader to get ANY media coverage at all, it does not HELP our cause very much for Sir Mr the Merciless to be just an old man sat in the corner. BUT because we are ALSO very much into local campaigning this does not HURT us so very much either.

On the other fluffy foot, the Conservatories are generally seen as EVIL and rely RATHER A LOT on Mr Balloon's media image to make them seem even remotely palatable, so it is probably much the worse for them if he's being seen as a bit of a PHONEY.


Professor Robert Winston's Life on Mars was funny, though.