John Random IS VAR (Victorian Animated Referee)
Football is not really my thing, but friendship that spans decades is. I used to write Newsrevue material with these fellas., back in the day…
The above is a very relevant early example of my “work”, not least because Victoria (whose father I was spoofing in that lyric) directed and appeared in It’s A Funny New Game.
Anyway, I took the very slight detour from my regular routes twixt W2 and NW8 to revisit the Canal Café Theatre and see friends Mark Keegan and John Random in their football-oriented comedy show, It’s A Funny New Game.
The show is timed to coincide with the advent of a football world cup and much of the comedy is thus topical. What else would you expect from former Newsrevue stalwarts?
It was lovely to meet up with some of the old Newsrevue crowd the night I attended: Barry Grossman, Graham Robertson and even a special guest appearance from Harriet Quirk, which was a lovely surprise.
The show is bound to be funnier to people who understand the football jokes than it was to me. But some of the humour is universal, as are the characters. Egotist Barry Mousetrap – a theatrical football manager who struggles to separate compering a show with managing a football team. The god-fearing, temperance-touting Victorian referee played by John Random, who also excelled as a 120-year-old Uruguayan retired footballer, who recalls being chased by adoring female fans in the style of Pete & Dud: “Calm down girls, back off, form a orderly queue”…or words to that effect.
I enjoyed the video fillers that enabled some costume changes and provided some relief from the on-stage mayhem. The Sense & Sensibility spoof particularly pleased me (I’m partial to a bit of Jane Austen) although the football puns in that one were all wasted on me as I couldn’t contextualise them.
I could contextualise the Mastermind sketch, in which the England goalkeeper takes “inadvertently naming each member of England 2026 World Cup squad” as his specialist subject. This worked so well because, even if you didn’t know the names that were yet to come, you sort-of know that some of the names are going to be quite difficult to dovetail into a simple question and answer. Bellingham made me laugh out loud.
It was a game of one half, this show, as the whole show lasts about the length of one half of a football match. I think that’s about the right length for such a show.
But if you were not sated by my write up or by seeing the show, there is a book, linked below, available through that link or through other reputable and disreputable outlets.
Well done lads. Top performances. Now it’s time for your ice bath.
