Gareth Hale and Norman Pace are one of the most consistently entertaining comedy duos to emerge from the UK. They're irreverent brand of school-yard humour was always well scripted, staged and executed and the two appeared to have a genuine mutual rapport, and thus supported one another with the razor-sharp precision required for sketch comedy. In particular, Hale's expressive, walrus-like features make him an instant comedy attraction, the perfect vice to Pace's straight guy routine. Impressively, they could also reverse the roles and still produce genuine laughs.
Some of my personal highlights are Gareth Hale's jaunt to Spain, where he becomes totally inebriated, insults his host country and is forcibly removed from a Tapas bar ("and let's not forget, the generous Spanish hospitality"), Billy & Johnny and their adult-themed children's show ("one two drip on my shoe, three four not anymore") and one of the many music satires concerning the perils of wearing red hair ("oh yes it's utterly, utterly rotten to be ginger"). Really, there were so many highlights, every episode contained a memorable moment.
In later seasons, looking noticeably older and more portly, the pair relied on recurring characters (the cab driver's with the cockney dialect) that became more the subject than the vehicle to project the humour. Some of these worked (the well-hard boys for instance chanting "always drink from a broken glass and crack walnuts between the cheeks of me Arsenal, Arsenal, come on you gunners Arsenal"), although the formula seemed to be missing more often. But the best of Hale & Pace from seasons 2-4 and the ubiquitous 'Christmas Specials', offer hours of side-splitting humour that rank among the best of British comedy. If you're accustomed to that type of sketch comedy, then you should relish Hale & Pace.
