The jokes remain the same for Little Britain stars

When it comes to comedy, familiarity evidently breeds content.

The loudest bursts of applause at the opening of Little Britain's London season were reserved for those characters who have made their home in the nooks and crannies of the nation's funny bone.

As the curtain rose, the eternally put-upon Lou was gazing hopefully into the audience from a stage empty save for a vacant wheelchair.

"Has anyone seen Andy?" he enquired with an optimism not quite extinguished by long experience. "He's in your trousers!" shouted a wag, prompting David Walliams to preen at the presumed compliment to his manhood.

Then Andy appeared. Flying through the air on a wire, trailing smoke. "He's behind you!" came the predictable response, and we were suddenly and sadly plunged back into the iron parameters of a well-established routine.

Little Britain is, and always has been, a mildly satirical pantomime for grown-ups — i.e. anyone with a well-developed taste for misanthropy. The title alerts us to the fact that it presents a jaundiced view of the world that used to shelter under the resplendent umbrella of Great Britain.

There are no heroes on display here, only a gallery of rogues. For our delectation, David Walliams and Matt Lucas impersonate a cast of delusional, prejudiced, ignorant, maladjusted, malevolent, undisciplined, boorish types who, taken as a whole, represent the most obviously awful characteristics of this great country in which we live.

There are no nice guys here, with the possible exception of Lou, but he doesn't count because he's an idiot.

The problem with Little Britain is that it attacks the lowest common denominator with the least subtle of comedic weapons. The credo is a familiar one: take the ordinary, inflate it to grotesque proportions, and then start taking the mickey.

Vicky Pollard - now elevated to Victoria, having left school - is a perfect example. Introduced by the headmaster as a reformed character come to speak to a new generation of pupils, she emerges with a totmobile as wide as a Hummer.

The joke with Vicky can never be developed, it just gets presented in broader strokes.

Much the same is true of the rest of the lovable monstrosities, from Dafydd and Sebastian to Bubbles and Marjorie. With Walliams and Lucas it seems to be a case of, when in doubt, slip on a lady's outfit or make with the extreme mincing.

Which is a shame, because there were moments when these two fine comedy performers appeared to realise the limits of their mirth-inducing straitjackets and unbuckle them for a moment.

A slight fluffing of lines in the paint shop scene led the two protagonists to examine their comedy roles and to wonder, just for a moment, why they were so constrained by them.

Perhaps, when they have finished counting the cash from this wildly successful tour, Walliams and Lucas might care to consider making some comedy that comes spontaneously.