Tragically I Was an Only Twin: The Complete Peter Cook

When I was in college in the mid 70's, I saw Peter Cook and Dudley Moore open their Broadway version of "Good Evening" by passing each other on stage, turning their heads, and gently saying, "Hello." If you know some of the skits, you'll enjoy the occasional discrepencies, as those that made it to recordings had been tweaked with improvised additions and improvements. If you don't know the skits, you'll probably be adding some of these to your favorites by Bob and Ray, Morcombe and Wise, Dave Allen, Monty Python talk show parodies, and so on. The writing is witty and mostly subtle, with the well placed "groaners." Mostly, the book is a tribute to a humorist who didn't quite become a household name in every household (at least in the US), but who should have.

Sad to see sort of so-so appraisals of Cook's work. In film he was often a genius too, I think of "The Wrong Box" (where, in fact, it's Peter Sellers that comes off a bit lame) or his brilliant portrayal of the psychotic British PM in "Whoops, Apocalypse!" I remember him explaining to his cabinet--deadpan-- that British industry is suffering because of sabotage by pixies. (Michael Moore should have watched that film before directing Canadian Bacon, he might have learned a few things like political satire sometimes needs to be existential to ring true, it shouldn't always be just witch hunting). Anyway, that role alone should have made Cook's reputation. I can't imagine how anyone could not have found him funny in "Bedazzled" as his was the ultimate portrayal of the banality of evil--Satan being "bad" by scratching up people's record albums. Cook, unfortunately for us, not him, was one of the all-time great practitioners of the art of silliness and the absurd. That sort of stuff requires something special of an audience, a willingness to not try to "find meaning" in humor. We're a literal society these days, we take ourselves a tad too seriously, our humor is a bit self conscious and often it's just cruelty or mockery--the lowest forms. (A friend once commented on how funny her friends were and I told her no, all they did was ridicule and tear each other down. She thought about that and replied "Wow, you're right") Steve Oedekerk, creator of the wonderfully funny film "Kung Pow" complained how he had to seemingly justify everything he was doing in the film. Much of it was just pure wackiness, you simply can't explain or justify it. If you need the reasons why you can't explain it explained to you then you're lost, you'll never understand. It's a higher level of understanding and you'll need to go study with Buddhists or something. They know all the good jokes anyway. I just watched a great WC Fields flick, "International House." Someone asks Fields where he's going to sleep and he replies "On my left side, with my mouth open...wide open." The day people stop laughing at joyous absurdities like that (Most these days would seek a double-entendre or something equally dumb in that)is the day I pack up and move to Tibet. This is a wonderful book and it's sitting here remaindered for $5.98 in a few cases. Cook's writing reminds me of Robert Benchley's--he was another gentle absurdist who, fifty years ago, was a household name and a familiar face in the cinema. That's back when non-linear weirdness could be found in Bugs Bunny cartoons and for a while even in the funny papers with Krazy Kat. Many of the best writers of his generation considered him to be the funniest man alive too and he may well have been. All his books are out of print except for a small collection. This is also sad beyond reckoning. Honestly I don't see the shift in humor to be simply a matter of taste or trends. Not "getting" Peter Cook means dropping humor down a fair number of

It is typical of Peter Cook that he should be simultaneously neglected and overrated. Most people, even in Britain, probably remember little or nothing of him - but those who do form the most idolatrous of fan-clubs. The Stephen Fry quote on this book's cover, "The funniest man who ever drew breath" is a typical example. Cook's tragedy was that his humour was most effective by far in a roomful of people; slightly diluted on the stage, it lost something more on TV, and I could not help but notice that I ploughed my way through this 400-page book with frequent smiles but only an occasional laugh. His attempts to break into films were actually embarrassing, as a viewing of the original "Bedazzled" will confirm. As William Cook points out in his perceptive Introduction, "Cook was a miniaturist. His speciality was a conversation of only several minutes duration. His quick-fire creativity didn't lend itself to longer, more structured genres". Consequently, his best work was done in cooperation with others. For instance, although Cook wrote about two-thirds of the script for "Beyond the Fringe", the result would not have been nearly as entertaining without the contributions of Alan Bennett, Jonathan Miller and Dudley Moore. Like a powerful spirit, Cook's wit was potent - but perhaps best when diluted even slightly. This book is a fine collection of Cook's work, together with a good deal of information about his life. It is, however, far from "complete", although approaching this goal more closely in the later years when Cook's output was much reduced. It makes a great companion to Harry Thompson's biography of the great man.

Peter Cook is beyond description, so genius will have to do. This book, while imperfect and incomplete, is the best argument yet for his canonization. Buy it, read it again and again. My only beef (and it's a small one) is there no Bedazzled script.