Press Contact: Megan Stone
October 2025
Following a successful West End run, New York season and UK tour, producers Jamie Wilson Productions and Emily Wood for Evolution Productions are delighted to announce that the critically acclaimed comedy The Last Laugh will return for a UK and Ireland tour in 2026, coming to Theatre Royal Plymouth from 05 – 09 May 2025. Tickets will be on sale soon.
The Last Laugh features Britain’s Got Talent finalist Steve Royle as Eric Morecambe, alongside Damian Williams as Tommy Cooper and Simon Cartwright as Bob Monkhouse, both returning to reprise their roles. The cast is completed by Richard Hodder who is the Walking Cover for all three roles.
Producer Jamie Wilson said today “I am delighted to be working with Evolution Productions again to take Paul Hendy’s critically acclaimed The Last Laugh on another UK and Ireland Tour, visiting 19 venues. It is incredible that this production, which started at Edinburgh Fringe and has since played in the West End, New York, and around the UK, will build on this success for a subsequent year.
I’m also thrilled that Damian Williams and Simon Cartwright are returning to reprise their roles as Tommy Cooper and Bob Monkhouse, with the brilliant Steve Royle joining as Eric Morecambe, to bring these three iconic comedians to life onstage.”
Written and directed by Paul Hendy, The Last Laugh imagines three of Britain’s all-time greatest comedy heroes – Tommy Cooper, Eric Morecambe and Bob Monkhouse – in a dressing room, discussing the secret of life, death, comedy and what it means to be funny… really funny! Warm, funny, nostalgic and poignant, The Last Laugh was a sell-out hit when it first premiered at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 2024 and a critically acclaimed, five-star hit in the West End in 2025.
Steve Royle is a comedian, actor, radio presenter and variety performer, best known as a finalist on Britain’s Got Talent in 2020. He was recently voted Best Comic at the UK Pantomime awards 2025, for his role as Buttons in Cinderella at The Grand Theatre, Blackpool – a theatre where he has performed for the last 22 years. His other credits include the world premier tour and West End run of Naturally Insane: The Life of Dan Leno.
Damian Williams played Tommy Cooper in the tour of Being Tommy Cooper. His many other theatre credits include Edna Turnblad in the national tour of the musical Hairspray as well as the national tour of The Ladykillers and the plays Bouncers and Educating Rita. For the past 17 years he has been the resident Dame in the pantomimes at the Sheffield Lyceum and was awarded Best Pantomime Dame at The Great British Pantomime Awards.
Simon Cartwright has been an actor and impressionist since the 1980s, appearing at The Comedy Store many times. He has appeared in the award-winning Channel 4 hit Toast of London and the films Mother’s Day and Closure. He recently toured the UK in the stage play Howerd’s End in which he portrays the legendary comedian Frankie Howerd.
Richard Hodder West End credits include Andrew Jarvis in The Accused, Marston in And Then There Were None, Accidental Death of An Antichrist and The Price. His other theatre credits include Ham/Thong/George in A Voyage Round My Father, Praed in Mrs Warren’s Profession and Noises Off all for Theatre Royal Bath, and the UK tours of The Importance of Being Earnest, A Game Called Malice, and Charley in Charley’s Aunt.
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The Last Laugh is written and directed by Paul Hendy, with Set Designer Lee Newby, Composer and Musical Arranger Ethan Lewis Maltby, Sound Designer Callum Wills, Lighting Designer Johanna Town, Costume Designer Amy Chamberlain and Casting by Kate Roddy.