Sheeps, the sketch comedy threesome, had never really gone away but when they performed Live and Loud Selfie Sex Harry Potter at the Edinburgh Fringe last year after a four-year absence, it was called a comeback. More a welcome reunion, as its members – Liam Williams, Daran Johnson and Alastair Roberts – had been busy doing solo projects.
The show, which they have brought to the Soho Theatre for a short run, is in the same vein as their previous work – original and intelligent sketch comedy with a touch of edginess and the surreal.
It’s an insightful exploration of long-lasting friendships that have to weather the strain of adult lives increasingly spent elsewhere, whether in relationships, parenthood or forging a career.
That makes the hour sound rather serious, yet it's not – although parts of it do tug at the heartstrings. It’s gloriously silly, starting with something their fans would never have thought they would see at a Sheeps show, a song-and-dance number. But it's one in which none of the three can either sing in tune or keep in step. The hour also contains a very clever meta sketch as they replay a scene over and over as nitpicking corrections are made to imaginary mistakes; it's a masterly piece of writing and performing that shows just how talented the three men are.
As the hour progresses, we gradually see the narrative – of how Williams and Roberts were gulled into getting the old gang back together again – emerge. The story is constantly interrupted by Johnson moping about, describing his pain at his recent split from his girlfriend.
Sheeps perform both short- and long-form sketches, which ultimately link to reveal the show’s purpose, including one set in an East London tech start-up with its own in-house riddler, another that takes a well-aimed dig at provocative thinker Jordan B Peterson, a breakdown of Shaggy’s “It Wasn’t Me” and, most inspired, a sketch that only late in do we realise is a scathing denunciation of Western attitudes to Syrian refugees.
The tone moves between arch and subtle, between surreal and playing it absolutely straight, and they hit their targets bang-on. Terrific fun.
