At the end, as we shuffled out of the auditorium, a wickedly funny Randy Newman song, Political Science, played over the speakers. The mischievous call to set the world free by dropping nukes made an ironic coda to Vera Lynn singing We’ll Meet Again.
It also made you wish the show’s co-adaptors, Armando Iannucci and Sean Foley, had applied a few more creative flourishes to what is, all in all, a stolid remake of the classic Stanley Kubrick Cold War satire.
Don’t get me wrong: this is still a decent star vehicle for Steve Coogan, who outdoes Peter Sellers by taking on four rather than three of the main characters. As well as portraying US president Merkin Muffley, RAF Group Captain Mandrake