Captain Moonlight

HALLO there. Enjoying yourselves? Smile, it might never happen. Yes, you, sir. Sorry, madam. Tell you what, there's a funny thing happening in the world of comedy at the moment. No, there is, there is. All these old comics are being rediscovered and hailed as titans of the titter game. They are, they are. Me, I blame that Newman and Baddiel, but there's no doubt about it, fashionable dining tables are currently in thrall to discussions of the witty referential post-modernism of Bruce Forsyth's toupee. Latest up is Jimmy Tarbuck, who has a new television chat show. Jimmy Tarbuck. No, no, don't laugh. You weren't? Please yourself. But let's not stop at Tarbuck. There are some other great acts out there, waiting. Little and Large, masters of an almost Chekhovian pathos; Ronnie Corbett, very small but all heart; Terry Scott, that master of the minimal; Norman Vaughan, creator of those ineffable ying-yang catchphrases which captured the dualism of an age, 'swinging' and 'dodgy'; that young, fast-talking fellow with glasses, Ben Elton, and his friend, Tracey Pullman, what happened to her? And the chubby one with the droll gimmick, reminiscent of the great Robb 'the day war broke out' Wilton, Paul Merton was it? What's he doing now? It's a shame Bernie Winters didn't live to be rediscovered. They'll probably take up Bob Monkhouse next. Stranger things have happened. They have, they have.