Tommy Cooper is Dome's brain

The jokes of the late comedian Tommy Cooper will live on in the Millennium Dome.

The jokes of the late comedian Tommy Cooper will live on in the Millennium Dome.

It was announced yesterday that Cooper's voice will be used as the voice of a madcap "comedian brain" inside the Dome's Body Zone.

A three-dimensional brain, complete with fez, microphone and glass of water, will be on a stage and under the spotlight, telling classic Cooper gags to visitors who pass through the Body Zone. An audience of other brains will laugh and heckle Cooper, who died in 1984. The comic brain is just one of many types of brain that will be on display in the Body Zone and will demonstrate various emotions.

The leader of the creative team behind the Body Zone,John Hackney, said: "Tommy was master of stand-up comedy and the rapid-fire gag, and this made him the ideal choice for the voice of the Comedian Brain inside the Body Zone."

Visitors will to the Brain Room will stand inside a giant human skull, behind massive teeth, to hear the comedian's jokes, which have been assembled from various routines he performed during his career.

Delays in construction work at the Millennium Commission flagship Earth Centre means it will be closed to the public until next July. Planning permission for the next phase of building work at the £100m centre near Doncaster, South Yorkshire, will not be granted until January at the earliest.