Jollygoodlarks conform to the internet school of naming: mash all your words together to form an unwieldy hybrid. YouTube. PayPal. LinkedIn. Jollygoodlarks. Say it in a oner and don't you dare pause for breath. For the next 60 minutes, that’s exactly how our comedy duo play it, darting frenetically about the stage, barely bothering to inhale or give the audience a moment's respite from their sensory onslaught.GregHaisteandMarieLawrence - sorry, Greg Haiste and Marie Lawrence - would like to teach us about the music business. The trials and tribulations, the pitfalls, the secrets to ascending like a supernova. To do so, they have enlisted the help of a host of illustrious friends including Liam Gallagher, Prince William and Kate Winslet. They are aided in their quest by a flip chart and two strips of gaffer tape which, as everyone knows, make for a convincing set of bushy eyebrows.Jollygoodlarks' slapstick humour is largely based around malapropisms, with the duo repeatedly misinterpreting one another's innocuous comments. In fairness, which of us hasn't mixed our kowtows and camel-toes? It's an easy mistake to make. Occasionally, it's a little too Carry On for comfort. More often than not, however, the humour works wonders, as is the case with sleazy record exec 'Pe-to' Pete who is nonplussed by the kids that have taken to chanting his moniker at him.Greg Haiste is wholly convincing as the younger Gallagher sibling, right down to the trademark whine and overgrown eyebrows. In saying that, it's hardly Oscar-winning material: you could stuff anyone in a green parka, order them to assume their most guttural Manc snarl and achieve the same result. Moreover, why are they even basing their show around a faded rockstar? It still works, but it would have worked an awful lot better a decade ago.The double-act fare better as Wills & Kate, helped in part by Lawrence’s uncanny resemblance to the Duchess of Cambridge and Haiste's innate ability to play a toffish buffoon. To the tune of Jay-Z's '99 Problems', they flounce about, waving royally and exchanging handshakes with the commoners as evidence of just how much they're keeping it real. It's junk food comedy, satisfying at the time, even if it later leaves you hungering for something more substantial. Before long, the aristocratic overtures have given way to belly-button farts and a ditty about the difference between sodomy and buggery.Like most comedy, it's fugacious material that is unlikely to provoke meaningful dinner party chat about the insidious fame-hungry society we inhabit. Of course it's not Jolllygoodlarks' fault that their show is incapable of bringing about world peace or ending apartheid. Like the Britpop era that spawned it, Jollygoodlarks will leave no lasting legacy. Still, it was a supersonic riot while it lasted.
