There’s a simple and brilliant premise to the Burton Brothers‘ ‘1925’. We are transported back to the roaring Jazz Age. illicit booze, flapper girls, and vaudeville is the order of the day. There’s a new optimism after the horrors of the Great War and the Spanish flu. So we’ll just ignore that looming sensation of dread, and so what if we habitually wake up screaming about mortars and trenches and mustard gas?

‘1925’ is a series of sketches ingeniously presented as segments within the Fizz Bang Hour wireless show, punctuated by spot-on pastiches of ads for cigarettes (‘The only brand I let my son smoke!’), and the original recipe for Coca-Cola. We get jaunty musical numbers, squabbles between film stars, the proprietors of a freak show, and various other oddballs and misfits. It’s all beautifully structured, and there isn’t a second that Tom and Josh Burton don’t spend at the very limit of commitment, but there’s a nagging something that stops ‘1925’ short of greatness.

Again, no-one could possibly fault the endeavour. Josh in particular is truly gifted at nailing various dialects – Southern-fried preacher, Midwest hick, that staccato masculine radio voice that was incredibly specific to that era – and the hall of mirrors sketch is a near-genius piece of physical comedy (the poor boy’s taken the knees out of his trews just a few days into the run). Tom is at his best in the traditional role of (relatively) straight man. His performance as the shellshocked war vet struggling manfully through a patriotic military song digs into some real pain even as it demonstrates some great comic timing. It’s unfortunate then that the sketches where he gets to be at his most outlandish happen to be the weaker ones.

The divorce counselling sketch is a case in point. Tom’s insane , deluded preacher’s wife hits a wave of fixed-rictus grotesquery, but it’s stretched past the point of elasticity and it coincide with a spot of improv and audience interaction that comes a little unstick due to a curiously reticent crowd. It may also rub devotees of the Universal monsters canon up the wrong way that Dracula and Frankestein both came out in 1931. So, while Josh’s Bela Lugosi impression is incredible, having Frankenstein’s monster and Dracula swiping waspishly at each other over coming sequels feels like a bit of a cheat in this solidly silent-era context.

Despite these misgivings, ‘1925’ is a very good sketch show. The Burtons have a real knack for ending a sketch on a decent gag, and the bookended structure isn’t so rigid that they can’t indulge in a throwaway line, or indulge in some back and forth with their mischievous sound tech as he deliberately misses cues, plays incorrect samples, or keeps a particular sound effect going far longer than necessary. The show’s modern-day parallels are also clear without impinging on the show itself. ‘1925’ has been – and will continue to be – a crowd pleaser wherever it’s been performed, but there’s still a feeling that the great premise could be mined for greater gems.

‘1925‘ is at Assembly George Square – The Crate until Sun 24 Aug 2025 at 16:20