Tommy’s a hard act to follow

JUS LIKE THAT: A NIGHT OUT WITH TOMMY COOPER, Lowry Quays

TOMMY Cooper was a giant of British comedy — metaphorically, thanks to his long years at the top of variety, and actually, thanks to a 6ft 4in, lumbering frame and size 13 feet.

Clive Mantle, best known from “Casualty” and spin-off “Holby City”, is similarly a large guy, and in a fez and Tommy’s trademark suit looks remarkably close to our late hero in every way.

The difference is that Mantle, just a couple of weeks into a four-month tour, doesn’t share Cooper’s comic timing, nor his personality.

Where Cooper really was the hard-drinking comic with a fine line in completely lame jokes, delivered with a vacant, increasingly desperate stare and visitor-here connection to humanity at large, Mantle always looks like he is playing a role.

That isn’t to say he isn’t playing the role very well. He does the jokes, walks the wandering walk and laughs the low-down, nervous laughs with a great deal of skill.

But as someone once pointed out, anyone can imitate Cooper for the three seconds it takes to say the catchphrase that provides the title of former TV producer John Fisher’s show. But impersonating a comedy icon for more than two hours is a bit harder.

The show demands a lot: the 40-minute first act asks for a typical Cooper performance, warming up the audience as he goes. Where the original could get a laugh by walking on, saying something stupid and offering that stare, Mantle needs 10 minutes to get a good reaction.

The second-half has more backstage interaction with his stage assistant (Carla Mendonca, once a familiar Coliseum face), relaxing between acts in his dressing room, coaxing his tired, worn-out body back to life while preparing for act two.

At the end we see the actor recreate the gag that was to be his last before collapsing in front of the TV audience. What follows is a rather oddball scene in heaven.

The point here is that this is just an entertainment. It tells us little we didn’t already know about Cooper or could get from watching one of many “comedy heroes” TV shows.

It’s an amusing couple of hours, but has many forced laughs where Cooper wouldn’t have any: they would all be genuine ones — the difference between the original and a copy.