Funny Bones 1995

Tommy Fawkes Oliver Platt is the son of British comedy legend George Fawkes Jerry Lewis. After his Las Vegas act flops with his beloved father in the audience, Tommy returns to Blackpool, the English seaside resort where he spent the summers of his childhood. Disguised with a new identity, Tommy intends to seek out unique performers and purchase their acts. During this time, Tommy encounters his father’s old comedy partners, Bruno and Thomas Parker. Once great performers, they now work as ghouls on a ghost train at Blackpool Pleasure Beach Circus. Bruno’s son Jack Parker Lee Evans is a brilliant comic, but psychologically troubled. He has also been manipulated by a corrupt policeman known as Sharkey Ian McNeice into stealing valuable wax eggs from smugglers. Tommy meets Jack’s mother Katie Parker Leslie Caron, and even though Tommy is in disguise, she suspects that he is somehow connected to the family. Tommy eventually realises that his father stole his original act from the Parker brothers. He then reveals himself to be Tommy Fawkes and Katie tells him that Jack is his half-brother. Tommy phones his father about the revelation and George gets on the next plane to Blackpool. As part of their reconciliation, George arranges for the Parkers to top the bill at a Blackpool Tower Circus event. However, Jack is still hounded by Sharkey and cannot perform. During an elaborate Egyptian act, Katie gets rid of Sharkey via a sarcophagus, which is then kidnapped by the smugglers. The wax eggs (the Chinese inscription on egg is read “Eight Immortals”) contained a mystical, ancient Chinese rejuvenating powder. Jack had previously placed the powder within a makeup tin, which Bruno and Thomas accidentally use, helping them to perform brilliantly. Toward the end of the show, Jack is seen being chased by a policeman and climbing a giant flexible pole to escape. The pole rocks side to side and Jack spins around on the flexing pole, and smacks the climbing policeman in the face. The policeman begins to fall and is revealed to be Tommy. In the last moments, Jack clasps Tommy’s hand and saves him, both now wildly swinging around at the end of pole. The circus audience claps wildly with relief. Jack yells to Tommy, “I think they’re beginning to like you.”

I think they’re beginning to like you.

The moment of triumph is intimate and electric, with the two brothers finally united in a shared spectacle that blends danger, humor, and family reconciliation. The surrounding chaos—stage acts, hidden identities, and a web of smugglers—creates a vivid backdrop for a story about legacy, forgiveness, and the complicated ties that bind performers to their craft. The mood stays grounded in Blackpool’s carnival atmosphere, balancing between darkness and whimsy as the past and present collide on the circus floor.