on last night’s telly
The Fast Show: Just a Load of Blooming Catchphrases, Gold/ NOW TV: ★★★★★
No offence, but you’d have to hope the title of this celebration of the greatest sketch show of all time was a little tongue in cheek.
Even before its heart-breaking and beautiful tribute to the late Caroline Aherne, this documentary proved the BBC2 show was so much more than catchphrases.
A quarter of a century on, we saw a host of memorable characters who were still utterly relatable – and reassuringly hilarious.
Gold’s masterstroke was persuading the cast to get back into their costumes and have their characters talk about their time on the show as if they were real people.
Obviously that wasn’t possible in Caroline’s case. What they did instead was, well, brilliant.
We saw John Thomson dressed as Roy, sitting on his sofa with an empty space to his right.
When he was asked to comment, all he could do was look to that empty space.
He was clearly hoping Caroline’s Renée would start him off with a quick, “What did I say, Roy?”. And he wasn’t the only one.
It was such a powerful moment it left me imagining that these characters had whole other lives away from the quick-fire sketches.
It’s such a pity that, Ted & Ralph and Swiss Toni aside, we never got to see them for more than a couple of minutes at a time.
Still, at least this retrospective helped me finally pin down my top five characters. And if you don’t agree with this list, you ain’t seen me – right?
1. Ted & Ralph
2. Rowley Birkin QC
3. Competitive Dad
4. Roy and Renée
5. Johnny Nice Painter and Katie.
‘‘ The show’s characters are still utterly relatable – and hilarious