The Trip to Greece review – Coogan and Brydon have the Midas touch

Scheduling The Trip to Greece (Sky One) to appear during the last dregs of a miserable, wet British winter is either an act of wanton cruelty or an escapist dream, depending on whether you’re feeling unreasonably upbeat or not. It is now 10 years since Rob Brydon and Steve Coogan began their culinary road trips, and, having taken in the Lake District, Italy and Spain, this fourth instalment looks to be the last. During promotion for the fourth series of the show, Coogan pointed out that even the jokes about The Trip becoming repetitive are in danger of becoming repetitive.

If it is the last series, then it is bowing out with dignity and sticking to what it knows best, rather than setting fire to its legacy and sending Brydon and Coogan off on an 18-30 all-inclusive at the Ibiza Rocks hotel, though honestly, I would watch that, too. This time, the pair have been “commissioned by the Observer” to retrace the steps of Odysseus, so The Trip to Greece begins in Turkey, with Coogan doing a Partridge “A-ha!” in a Trojan horse. Fans of the series will know that is pretty much the extent of it. They eat delicious-looking food, spar with one another, and there’s some serious location envy.

These cartoonish versions of Brydon (self-described as a “popular light entertainer”, jovial and family-centred) and Coogan (who settles for “troubled TV funnyman”, and is all dissatisfied ego) are familiar as they bicker and do impressions over dinner, and it conveys sufficient intimacy that it feels like dropping in on old friends. The series begins with a double-bill, and in this first episode, jokes about Aristotle’s Poetics are jumbled in with a Wales v Manchester debate and a “watery custard” dessert that looks a lot like something else. The pair discuss the nature of imitation and whether playing a real person could be considered an impression (there is some lovely meta fun to be had in the fact that they are doing imitations of themselves) before delivering impressions of Tom Hardy, Stan Laurel, Ronnie Corbett and John Hurt in The Elephant Man.

For the most part, the banter takes the lead: Brydon reveals he once lost a part to Ray Winstone, and there is an extended riff on a cockney Henry VIII that it tickles me to recall, as does Brydon’s reaction to an overly vigorous male masseur, an over-the-top response not seen since Monica allowed Phoebe to give her a massage in Friends. The pair stop off at the village where Mamma Mia! was filmed, which impresses a wide-eyed Brydon as much as it bores a cynical Coogan.

For all of its familiar warmth, though, it is sharp enough to cut through the holiday haze. Brydon asks Coogan what he is most proud of. Brydon says he is most proud of his children. For Coogan, also a father, it is his seven Baftas. There are plenty of knowing references to Coogan’s tabloid image, and a sad/funny point about the younger women he dates not sharing the same memories or references. The two run into a man who works with refugees on Lesbos, who knows Coogan from a film they made together, and they drop him off in their extravagant gifted car, on the way to their next luxurious meal. By episode two, real life, or the scripted version of it, has begun to intrude, as the hint of a plot drops in, and Coogan finds out his father is ill again.

Though only half an hour each, the episodes feel oddly timeless; you could have been watching for 10 minutes, or three hours. Partly, that is Michael Winterbottom’s direction – unhurried, soothing and deeply satisfying. Whether you are watching them singing on a ferry, or picking up on Brydon’s sly delight that exclamations of “A-ha!” follow Coogan everywhere he goes, you are simply right there in it, happily going along for the ride.

There are few better people through whom to enjoy a vicarious holiday. The food looks so good that you can almost imagine the taste of it, and if Secret Cinema can put on an interactive Stranger Things event, then perhaps they might consider trying The Trip, too, where you get to eat incredible food against beautiful backdrops, stay in gorgeous hotels and listen to two funny men gently needling each other for a few hours. There’s the odd moment of over-familiarity – a joke about a Bafta preview DVD felt a little industry-smug – but if this is to be the last of The Trips, then it is a beautiful note to end on.