Alistair McGowan: not just a pretty voice

“Ten years ago I had my own series, whereas now…” muses Alistair McGowan, gesturing to the not quite sold-out theatre of Warwick Arts Centre. And you can’t help but sympathise with him. In the early 2000s, McGowan starred in BBC One’s BAFTA winning The Big Impression, a sketch show in which he became known for impersonating, among many others, David Beckham, Seven-Göran Eriksson, Louis Theroux and Dot Cotton. Since the series ended in 2004, he has been doing a lot of theatre work (including a role in a production of Little Shop of Horrors which I was lucky enough to see a few years ago) but he no longer seems to be a familiar face on primetime television. This is a huge shame, as McGowan’s latest tour Not Just A Pretty Voice proves that he is just as talented and entertaining as he was before, if not more so.

In his tightly scripted two-hour show, McGowan demonstrates an extraordinarily wide array of impersonations, ranging from sports personalities and politicians to comedians and TV chefs. He doesn’t just perform spot-on mimicry; he also manages to deliver consistently funny material, which always separates the great impressionists from the merely competent ones. He portrays Rafael Nadal as a foreign exchange student superior to you in every way, ponders how Britain would change if everybody spoke like Ed Miliband (hint: muggers would be significantly less threatening), contemplates what would transpire if Prince Harry was trusted to babysit Prince George and shows how unhelpful Siri would be with the voice of David Mitchell or Kevin Bridges. I was in stitches at his reimagining of sporting events with commentaries by Graham Norton and Stephen Merchant, and I could have happily spent the entire show watching him recreate Dad’s Army and lampoon the familiar comedians of Mock The Week.

In addition to performing well over fifty voices (after a while I realised that there were far too many to count!), McGowan also proves to be an amusing stand-up comedian as he wonders if any man has ever paid attention to earrings, considers at what age it becomes socially acceptable to steal sugar packets from cafés, and derides the pickiness of the French about their language. He is an undeniably versatile performer and manages to constantly surprise the audience with the extent of his talents. For instance, his impersonation of Roger Federer results in him speaking both French and German, at one point even interweaving the two languages, and he has the chance to show off his impressive vocal skills when comparing Roy Hodgson to Fagin from Oliver. Moreover, he actually succeeds in mimicking a number of female voices (his impressions of Jo Brand and Sarah Millican received some of the biggest audience reactions of the night) which is something that male impressionists very rarely seem to get right.

As I mentioned before, it’s a real shame that Alistair McGowan is nowhere near as well-known as he was a decade ago, especially given that his talents have only become stronger. However, it appears that current television audiences are not exactly enthralled by sketch shows featuring impressionists, as two recent ones, BBC One’s The Impressions Show and Channel 4’s Very Important People, now seem to have faded away despite receiving a lot of publicity. For me, the main faults of those two shows were that the impersonations generally lost their novelty after being seen week after week and that the attempts to make the impressionists look like their targets were often embarrassingly unsuccessful.

Therefore, could stand-up comedy, where there is simply one person on stage with no requirement to use catchphrases or wear facial prosthetics, actually be the medium in which performing impressions is most effective? After seeing Alistair McGowan live, I believe this to be true, and I hope that you will have the chance to see him in the future and witness someone who really is at the top of his game.