Yes, they bicker. Yes, they do impressions. And, as well as celebrating food, this new series of improvised comedy also explores – brilliantly – masculinity and middle age
The rain in Spain falls mainly on the restaurant – a sudden autumn downpour that spills over the sides of the patio awning and swirls around the table legs at Txoko, a popular bistro overlooking the harbour in the Basque town of Getaria. Diners run for cover, waiters hurry tables, chairs, crockery indoors, and Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon stand in the doorway, continuing their lunchtime conversation about the death of Sir Thomas More and how they would each choose to execute the other. “I like it when people think this is real,” says Brydon, as the rain hammers down. “I would never have such a toxic conversation with a friend.”
Since it began in 2010,The Trip has made unexpectedly devotional viewing. It is a curious premise: Brydon and Coogan play exaggerated versions of themselves – two sometime friends, comedians in middle age, dispatched to review restaurants together. First they headed to the north of England, dining at L’Enclume and the Inn at Whitewell and riffing over Wordsworth and Coleridge, Michael Caine and sticky toffee pudding. Next came an adventure through Italy, from Liguria to Capri, filled with seafood linguine and artichokes, Byron and Shelley and Alanis Morissette. It is a show brimming with impressions, niggles, tenderness, and it has proved not only wonderful television and a celebration of regional food, but also a sumptuous portrait of masculinity.
Related: The Trip to Italy: Britain's best ever improv comedy series?
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