Within the first two minutes of the new Dodger adventure, our top-hatted hero has been challenged to a duel by the president of the United States of America, which is a problem because Dodger (Billy Jenkins) is brandishing a gun that is actually a stick. His mentor, Fagin (Christopher Eccleston), fashions an escape using a bunch of nettles, and this rollicking Dickens prequel is up and running again – although Fagin doesn’t quite run fast enough to avoid being shot up the backside by a furious president.
Dodger, which follows the Artful Dodger, Fagin and a gang of young thieves in the years before the events of Oliver Twist, is the creation of Rhys Thomas, who was once a part of the Fast Show’s cast – he was the car showroom employee who had to listen to Swiss Toni’s “making love to a beautiful woman” comparisons – and who went on to help Simon Day create spoof prog-rocker Brian Pern. His most underrated work is A Year in the Life of a Year, a mangled New Year roundup that showcased his talent for the lightly silly and the purely funny, skills that make him the ideal author of a comedy for older kids and childish adults.
In this special episode, entitled Coronation, the US president is visiting what is about to officially become Victorian London. The new queen is to be crowned, which means Dodger and his crew have only one aim: steal the crown. As they duck, dive and scheme, we can once again enjoy the show’s aptitude for doing old jokes so well that they feel new. There are silly voices; a scene where someone says “starting … now!” but with a 20-second pause before the “now”; some fine business with two cups of tea, one of which has been spiked with laudanum; and a moment where an idiotic police constable, played by Thomas himself, says “I hate you!” and walks out of shot, the hilarity of which can only be explained by saying that Thomas is blessed with perfect comic timing.
He’s also got all the right contacts. Dodger already has Eccleston enjoying himself shamelessly as Fagin, a mercurial toe-rag with an outrageous cockney accent, and Lenny Rush of Am I Being Unreasonable? fame as Morgan, an all-knowing shoeshine boy a la Johnny from Police Squad!. But when the call goes out for Christmas guest stars, suddenly there is luxury casting everywhere you look.
After the cold open air and its flying bullets, we are inside Buckingham Palace, where the crown jeweller and the archbishop of Canterbury are briefing the queen about the upcoming ritual. The jeweller is Alex Macqueen, laying his simpering fusspot shtick on thick – the crown is decorated with “heleven hhemeralds and five woobies” – while the archbish is a deliciously tremulous Simon Callow, for whom “globe” is a word with three syllables. Best of all, the queen is played by Nicola Coughlan from Derry Girls and Bridgerton, whose faultless English-aristocrat accent adorns a portrayal of the young Victoria as a perpetually bored, highly impressionable tyrant-in-waiting, a sort of gen Z Violet Beauregarde.
Vic is visibly excited by the arrival of President Martin Van Buren, AKA Toby Stephens, who has already got a big laugh with his impenetrable pronunciation of the word “duel” and who continues to romp in wide-legged cowboy mode through every scene he’s in: grabbing people by the lapels, hoicking up phlegm just when it looks like he might be a love interest for the queen, and essaying a nasal southern accent where every vowel sound is a “U”.
There’s more! Tony Way is funny as Jon the News, a newspaper vendor who continues to bellow at the top of his voice when conducting a normal conversation – an old joke, but it’s done well – and there’s a toothsome guest role for Thomas’s old pal Paul Whitehouse as a stout yeoman of the guard, charged with keeping watch on the crown jewels, who isn’t quite stout enough.
Dodger, Fagin and their friends – including co-writer Lucy Montgomery, the other half of a husband-and-wife team with Thomas, as Fagin’s landlady Minnie Bilge – embark on a caper that involves stealing the replica crown that sits atop the Madame Tussauds waxwork of the queen (also played by Nicola Coughlan), then swapping it for the real one during the coronation rehearsal. Before the heist kicks in, the run-through features a terrific running gag where Victoria impatiently shouts “skip!” at the archbishop of Canterbury, forcing him to omit the dull parts of his script and eventually making him sound like someone frantically fast-forwarding through a lacklustre podcast.
There is a laugh every minute in Dodger but, perhaps more importantly, a general feeling of being given an unconditional treat. It’s a lovely early Christmas present.
• Dodger is on CBBC and is available on iPlayer. It will also be shown on BBC One later this month
