Peacock and Gamble

Brewery Arts Centre Freerange Comedy Festival, Kendal

A good double act is more than straight man and comedian. It’s a balanced act with give and take between the partners, either of which is enjoyable in their own right. It’s a warm, on-stage personality. More than the sum of the parts. It’s a rare and precious thing.

Meet Peacock and Gamble. They’re an excellent double act. Their new show is called Peacock and Gamble Don’t Even Want To Be On the Telly. It was performed at the Brewery to a less-than capacity audience. Shame on you all. You missed a treat.

Their show is pacy, fun, delightfully ludicrous and carefully crafted. It was a proper show. It had a beginning, an end, an interval, a slide show and an application to be on The Apprentice. It also had some very good jokes, including a new definition of martyr which you’re going to love.

Peacock and Gamble skirt the dangerous area which borders on silly without descending into the puerile. In fact, it’s very self-aware and these two know their craft. They play with the form. The show began with Ray Peacock marching up to the front row and shouting: “Hello man in the front row. What’s your name? What’s your job? Let’s make a joke about the village next door.”

The two are very at ease with each other on stage. There was some good ad-libbing at the Kendal show and it was good to see two performers enjoying themselves on stage, rather than going through a routine.

Double acts are an odd thing. Like Lee and Herring before them, these two have their own solo acts but something new emerges when the two of them are on stage together. I think they should be on TV but it would be a huge shame if it was at the expense of seeing them live.

Catch them NOW before they become huge.

Colin Shelbourn