Mark Thomas (I)

Comedy in 2012: review of the year

Veronica Lee rounds up 2012 in comedy and reveals her highlights of the year. Highlights include Mark Thomas, Alan Davies and Susan Calman.

The best comedy performances of 2012

Featuring Doctor Brown, Pappy's, Alexei Sayle, Alfie Brown and Mark Thomas.

Mark Thomas interview

Left-wing comedian Mark Thomas, 49, has written his latest show, Bravo Figaro! about his father's battle with a degenerative neurological illness.

Mark Thomas interview: Don't tell them it's theatre!

Political activist and comedian Mark Thomas talks to Emma McAlpine about his most theatrical and personal show to date.

Mark Thomas interview: 'I don't do stand-up anymore'

Mark Thomas provides an overture to his new theatre/comedy show, Bravo Figaro!, about his domineering and opera-loving father.

Imagine if the Jackass boys sacked Steve O and replaced him with Mark Thomas. At times, that's the vibe of this prankishly political comedy show. Every now and then, creators Heydon Prowse and Jolyon Rubinstein nail it; the tax affairs of Vodafone are put under the spotlight in a brilliantly ballsy guerilla rebranding exercise, while a nicely placed blue plaque testifies to the rampant inconsistencies in the economic vision of George Osborne. Elsewhere, the pranks are less successful - no one's going to match Chris Morris in the absurd public vox pops stakes, so it's probably not worth trying. Still, it's great that this kind of material is getting an airing on BBC3 - perhaps comedy's response to the parlous state of the nation is beginning at last.

You can't imagine Jolyon Rubinstein or Heydon Prowse getting elected as prime minister but they do wage a bold revolution against 'hypocrisy, greed, and corruption' in this snortingly funny satire. There are street pranks targeting bankers and government officials, spoof news pieces that have a whiff of The Day Today about them, and a campaigning zeal that would make Mark Thomas proud.

A colourful collision of Mark Thomas and Dom Joly, this political hidden-camera prankathon is fact-packed, judiciously targeted, scarily well performed and, often, splutteringly funny.

The stars, Jolyon Rubinstein and Heydon Prowse, set out to satirise tax avoidance, state violence, banker bailouts and other 21st-century injustices - their main weapon being sheer cojones. I was laughing and stuffing my fist in my mouth at the same time as they fired stupid questions at policemen mid-riot, tried to climb over MI6's front gate and, in the best sketch, proved that Tony Blair's central London mansion isn't as heavily guarded as it's cracked up to be.

There are shades of Chris Morris, Mark Thomas and Dom Joly in this new series, a politically skewed news and sketch-based satire. The programme-makers have already hit the headlines in a stunt when the Chancellor George Osborne was handed a GCSE book to help with his maths skills at a speech to bankers. Now seeking out corruption, greed and hypocrisy, Heydon Prowse and Jolyon Rubinstein aim to humiliate and expose everyone from bankers and celebrities to Olympic organisers and tax-avoiding diplomats. Funny up to a point, even if you get the impression it's been done more artfully before.

Video: Sue Perkins chats to Mark Thomas

Sue Perkins meets Mark Thomas to discuss his critically acclaimed new comedy show at the Traverse Theatre, Bravo Figaro.