Jono and Ben at Ten: Three into two doesn’t go

1
11

jono-ben-10

The TV comedy buddy duos I grew up with were British. Morcambe and Wise and the Two Ronnies ruled in the days of two channels. They were bonkers, and we liked bonkers back then because we were British as well. Watching ‘Jono and Ben at Ten’ (Jono Pryor and Ben Boyce, TV3 Fridays, 10pm) you can’t help wonder how far we have come – and how far we may have fallen in the process.

It must be hard to get such a combination right, especially if they haven’t worked together forever – as appears to be the case with Jono and Ben. And especially if the duo is actually a threesome – as it appears to be with Jono and Ben + Guy. That’s half to a third of the problem right there.

Not that there are many successful pairings that have transcended television and into the enduring legacy of the DVD box set. On that score prehaps the Top Twins are as close to French and Saunders as this country gets, and we had Havoc and Newsboy as our cheeky dickheads who turned out to be many yardglasses ahead of the groaning Australian failures that were the very self-satisfied Hamish and Andy.

The Flight of the Conchords are in a class of their own – or at least their own paragraph. Albeit, like their series, a short one.

I was not expecting that the Jono and Ben show would feature the sort of skipping and singing as Morcambe and Wise, but was a bit disappointed there was no cross-dressing drag scenes, or not nearly enough. Ben’s old show with his pal, Bill, had plenty of drag. They had their moments. It was mostly a drag act, actually. The first instinct they had in any gag was to put on women’s clothes. I wonder whose idea that was? A lot of weird stuff about that of course… that is best not said because of why no-one ever says anything about Bill anymore. So, not enough drag, but an awful lot of dressing up – usually in a mascot’s outfit.

This mascot thing seems to be carrying most of the show. And as it’s only a commercial half hour that’s a lot of airtime devoted to idiots running amok in mascot animal suits. The stunt of dressing up like a fool and acting accordingly has been accorded a status of an artform on this show. It’s partly a carry-over from all the gags that worked on the Bill and Ben show (Pulp Sport originally) and partly it’s the sort of cheap reality stunt in fitting with the lad/bloke genre akin to Jackass that the network people are attracted to. Most of the attraction being the low budget rather than the humour.

There is however quite a bit of singing and dancing – parodies of whatever has happened during the week usually – which is executed fairly well. At least I thought the Wiggles thing as druggies was pretty good – even if the set up was rushed. But that’s the necessary demands to keep the pace up. The viewer has to be fully switched on appreciate the banter and the pieces. It isn’t an unrealistic demand, but it is a relentless and rapid 30 minutes. Considering the brief seconds each of these sorts of stunts are on the show it must be some commitment in resources behind them. They are NZ On Air funded and they look to have squeezed a lot out of a traditionally empty tube.

TDB Recommends NewzEngine.com

TV3 uses their people well. The crew of Outrageous Fortune – at least two plus Theresa Healy (she must have appeared?) – found their way onto last week’s show. The celebrities and actors who pop up on the show (and on Bill and Ben, and the Jono show before that) are incredible. This keeps the audience keen – there could be anyone on at any moment. But do they always have to be dressed as fluffy animals?

The treatment of the current affairs aspects – the satire – is a strong point. Last week, at least, they did a good job. They covered Rachel Smalley’s racist and sexist baiting of Hekia Parata on the morning programme, they had Lachlan Forsyth’s parading his black eyes on Campbell Live. And if only they had known Peter Dunne was to implode earlier on their Friday air date they no doubt would have wigged out on that too.

The show should not be mistaken for a skit show however. It is comedy, but this is a late night show with a studio audience. The audience included X-Factor contestants who came in for plenty of good hearted, but well deserved, shit. The funniest part for me though was probably Tammy Davis dressed as a hardware store worker doing anything and everything the lads were telling him to when interacting with the unsuspecting customers. It was a crack up, but the ‘reality’ thing – the candid camera, the horrible surprise, the general harassment and torture of innocent members of the public and innocent animals can only go so far. Embarrassment isn’t always hilarity is it?

Some of the other gags are looking a bit worn too. The precocious children are, in the realms of worn, the equivalent of the nutter in the cop show driving on their rims with sparks flying. They had two such children interviewing X-Factor judge, Mel Blatt. Not so bad – but that’s because she’s Ms Nasty in the scheme of things and as such the kids could do as they please in that situation. Not so for the awkward third wheels’ awkward third wheel – Guy Williams’ mini-me precocious child – who went along to an All Blacks press conference to be silly. It was, a bit – slightly – silly. Silly and awkward. Hmmm. Yeah.

Like most – maybe closer to all – of Guy’s seconds on air are slightly awkward, but rarely in a funny way. This is a let down because the show, despite being billed as a pair, is a trio. And he is the weak link. He was literally throwing pies at one point to try to get a laugh. Oh dear. The deadpan isn’t working, the slapstick isn’t working… has he tried dressing up as a woman? He must do something. Something else. He is to Mediaworks what Jeremy Wells (Newsboy) was to TVNZ: the company’s unfunny dead-pan on the roster. He’s the nobody that is everywhere across the network. Dead pan is tricky and the trick isn’t working – for whatever reason. He’s weak – perhaps even as weak as Steve Wrigley on 7 Days – and that is hugely weak. Three into two does not go.

1 COMMENT

Comments are closed.