Dead Ringers: Smarting laughs

By the BBC's William Gallagher

New impressions comedy Dead Ringers has come to television for a one-off pilot in the hope that it can live up to the success of its Radio 4 original - and it does.

It is hilarious: not only laugh-out-loud funny but also brilliant enough to bring tears to your eyes.

"My name is Maximus Decimus Meridius," says John Culshaw as Russell Crowe in an opening sketch.

The impressions fall down on visual accuracy

"Father to a murdered son, husband to a murdered wife - and that's when I called Claims Direct."

The strength of Dead Ringers is in its attention to detail: the sketch ends with Crowe urging us to "phone MCXXXVI, that's MCX double-X VI".

It is smart comedy that expects its viewers to be smart too. Just as the original ripped away at Radio 4 shows, so this one assumes we will get the joke when it mercilessly picks at television shows and services.

Its take on Channel 4's Faking It, for instance, sees children's character Zippy trying to take the place of Cherie Blair.

It says Zippy hides the real Cherie where no one will see her: "Hosting BBC One's The Saturday Show".

Sight and sound

This certainty that we will share the gag is the key thing that Dead Ringers has taken from its radio original.

What it has left behind, though, is the real reason for the show's title. The original concentrates on vocal stunts such as "Tony Blair" calling the US government offering to mediate between Tom and Jerry.

The show's stars have superb skills of mimicry

Instead, the phone calls have transformed into a Candid Camera-like routine which, while good, are correctly reduced to a cameo role in the programme

The clearest sign that Dead Ringers has come from radio, however, is in its one failing: the impressions do not look as good as they sound.

Some certainly do - Delia Smith, Nigella Lawson and David Dickinson are instantly recognisable.

But visually its George Bush and Michael Buerk impressions are much weaker.

The show goes to lengths to hide people's faces until we have heard enough of their voice to recognise them.

Pouting

Yet, if the faces are sometimes not as good as others, that absolute attention to detail shines out.

There are myriad tiny visual gags like Jan Ravens' perfect copy of how Nigella Lawson's show is filmed, down to over-the-shoulder shots and pouting close-ups.

It shows you moments you simply did not realise you knew, such as exactly how Delia Smith pauses for breath after a sentence, and makes them very, very funny.

That just does not always happen when a hit radio show comes to television.

So the makers of Dead Ringers have done a difficult job extremely well and this edition is a tryout that truly deserves a series.