SWAN SONG HAS CLOUT AND DUO ARE A HOOT

From 1980 to 1988 on the telly box, writers Antony Jay and Jonathan Lynn delighted us with the dance between bumbling minister (later PM) Jim Hacker and the Machiavellian Permanent Secretary, Sir Humphrey Appleby, deliciously delivered by Paul Eddington and Nigel Hawthorne.

- With STEFAN KYRIAZIS

I'M SORRY, PRIME MINISTER ✶✶✶✶ APOLLO THEATRE UNTIL MAY 9 THEN UK TOUR TO AUGUST 1 imsorryprimeminister.​com

It's a testament to genius writing and performances that both spoofed and skewered Westminster, that it probably helped us understand the workings of government far more than any newspaper (on either side), and somehow had us rooting for the self-serving scoundrels far more than their real life counterparts.

Both actors are much missed, but Lynn has treated us to a predictably slyly written but surprisingly poignant theatrical swan song to their beloved characters.

Griff Rhys Jones broadens Hacker's peevish irrascibility into doddery cantankerousness. Living a pampered life as the master of an Oxford college he funded with highly dodgy foreign donors, he faces eviction after a series of politically incorrect scandals. Desperate, he begs his old sparring partner (a pitch perfect Clive Francis) to save his bacon one last time.

Lynn's dialogue remains as quicksilver as always. Humphrey's trademark tongue-twisting duplicitous monologues bring nostalgic cheers from a constantly chortling audience. His caustic comebacks are a hoot.

To Jim's protestation that he always kept an open mind, Humphrey adds, "Verging on an empty one." But there is also a completely new and potent dimension as these former masters of their universe face obsolescence, irrelevance and their own mortality.