Harvey, Garvey and The Kane

It's quite possible that sketch comedy reached the pinnacle of its achievement with the genuinely fertile and often surreal scripts of 1990s – A Bit of Fry & Laurie, Smack the Pony and Big Train, for instance. It's less successful, perhaps, when based on an overreliance on props and puns. Where, you might ask, have all the good writers gone? Stephen Harvey, Marcus Garvey and Gareth Kane’s joint effort, however, has rekindled some of the fine wordplay and delightfully painful encounters we came to expect from the likes of Mark Heap and Sally Phillips.

From toffs to tykes, the trio races through a barrage of exquisitely silly sketches, from David Attenborough’s nature documentaries told from the perspective of the primates to reforming man-child boybands who have since gone stale. It's a professional, trimmed routine aided by some quality acting and impressive preparation. The dialogue itself is neat, though there's a lot of familiar territory covered including awkward sex education and cheating lovers. While a lot of clichés are sidestepped, much of the inspiration behind the sketches feels recycled.

That said, all three are enormously gifted stage performers, and the chemistry of the ensemble feels natural. Stephen Harvey really shines; his rubbery face letting him indulge in all manner of characters, including a rather horny grandmother. There’s space to fill the set with more of these cringe-worthy cariactures, and to develop some of them even further. Still, it remains a dextrous and well-observed hour that can only benefit from further development.