David Threlfall

"I backed a horse at 20 to one. It came in at half-past four." Even if you don't care for the joke, it's irresistible as told by Tommy Cooper, perhaps the most intrinsically funny man who ever lived. David Threlfall is great as the comedian in this biodrama, with support from Amanda Redman as long-suffering wife Gwen and Helen McCrory as his mistress, Mary. A rather sad account of a man in declining health who spent a lifetime avoiding getting his round in, relieved by rib-tickling recreations of his stage act.

David Threlfall on Tommy Cooper

He can never remember jokes and he can't do magic - so how did Shameless star David Threlfall fill the shoes of Tommy Cooper for ITV's new biopic, Not Like That, Like This?

Son of Tommy Cooper's mistress talks about comedian's dark side

Shameless actor David Threlfall plays Tommy Cooper in a one-off drama series which pulls no punches but - according to Tony Kay, the son of Cooper's mistress - neither did he.

David Threlfall interview

"Audiences already loved Tommy, but when his magic tricks didn't work, they loved him all the more," says Threlfall.

Ah, those were the days, when Christmas specials featured frilly-shirted Sacha Distel and Clodagh Rodgers in a hostess gown singing cheesy songs in front of skinny TV studio Christmas trees. In this 1973 special these musical interludes break up Tommy Cooper's comedy business of pratfalls and carefully choreographed ineptitude, and some terrible sketches - one involving a game of billiards played with a golf club feels like it goes on for ten years.

But there's a certain piquancy to all of this, as David Threlfall will shortly play Cooper in an ITV bio-drama. Cooper and his comedy have developed a patina of affectionate cool in the years since his death, so it's the perfect chance to see why he endures.

Tommy Cooper's magic props to be used in ITV biopic

David Threlfall will play the legendary comedian in his original home - using props found in the attic.

David Threlfall: Frank Gallagher was a great mess

David Threlfall, 59, played 21st-century TV icon Frank Gallagher in Shameless. Now his career is a mixture of sleuthing, submarines - and a fez...

It's been a decade since David Threlfall's iconic waster Frank Gallagher swaggered on to our screens, effin' and blindin', fag dangling precariously out of his gob. But, 11 series in, we've waved goodbye to the Chatsworth estate (or, true to Gallagher style, given it the finger), though Frank's legacy lives on in William H Macy, who plays him in the American version of the show, which has just been renewed for a fourth season. All 139 episodes of the original are available to watch on 4oD.

It's appropriate that David Threlfall, the one constant of this unfeasibly durable show, steps behind the camera for its final-ever episode. And fun, too, to see Anne-Marie Duff's Fiona joining the likes of Lip (Jody Latham), Kev (Dean Lennox Kelly) and Carl (Elliott Tittensor) in one last doomed attempt to tame the wild beast that is Threlfall's Frank Gallagher.

The plot, for what it's worth, sees most of the Gallagher brood reuniting for funeral so farcical that Fiona determines to take the remaining kids back down south with her. Can Frank, just out of prison and with itchy feet, rediscover a modicum of interest in fatherhood? A couple of half-hearted jokes about Jesus and abortion show that the series hasn't entirely sacrificed its aggressive taboo-busting for cartoonish irrelevance. But this is a shabby, subdued finale to a show that once fizzed with vigour, invention and purpose.

Goodbye to Shameless. What does it leave behind?

As the long-running television comedy comes to a close, David Herman wonders what its legacy will be. Will David Threlfall best be remembered as the feckless, drunken Frank Gallagher?