The prospect of spending an hour in the company of Donald and Melania Trump would be enough to make most people run for the hills.
But when it’s impressionists Ronni Ancona and Lewis MacLeod who are inhabiting the roles of the President and First Lady, the idea appeals.
The comedians have appeared as Donald and Melania at events as varied as Jools Holland’s Annual Hootenanny to charity events at the Dorchester Hotel.
Their next stop is the Edinburgh Fringe, where they premiere their show, Just Checking In.
The plot sees a once-glamorous Scottish hotel about to be taken over by President Donald Trump. An eclectic assortment of eccentric staff and celebrity guests conspire to prevent the acquisition.
All of which gives long-time friends Ronni and Lewis the chance to show off their considerable mimicry talents.
“We describe it as a psychological farce,” laughed Ronni. “We were looking for a way to put a new slant on the characters, comedy and impressions, and this is what we came up with.
“Part of the story is Lewis and I get taken over by the characters, which sounds dark, but it allows us to play ourselves and lets the audience get to know us as people.”
After one of Ronni’s appearances on QI, a viewer wrote to her and said she should be doing Melania.
Ronni began playing around with the character and thought of Lewis’ Trump impression to make it a duo.
“We go way back together, to 1995 when we were working on The Game’s Up radio show with Alistair McGowan,” said Lewis, who currently voices Postman Pat and was Sebulba in Star Wars: The Phantom Menace.
He is also heard regularly on Radio 2’s Steve Wright Show.
“When it came to this show, there was a time when we thought, ‘How do we learn this?’ It’s so rapid, with so many twists and turns. It’s quite a mental exercise.”
This isn’t the first Fringe for either of them.
Troon-born Ronni, who won a British Comedy Award for The Big Impression with Alistair McGowan, has fond memories of her past visits. “I remember being here in the early ’90s, it was a wonderful time, before the big polished corporate element came in.
“I did a show with Alan Francis and Alistair, then some solo shows, and I did one with Stewart Lee and Richard Herring at the beginning of their careers.
“It was very raw, experimental and rough around the edges back then, which made a lot of the shows exciting. I took a hiatus from it to have my two children – it’s hard to do the Fringe when the kids are younger.
“The first time I was here, I was on the cusp, and now I’ll probably have young comics helping me across the road!”
Lewis, brother of our very own columnist Donald, continued: “My first Fringe was in 1988, a 3am stand-up set that I did from behind the curtain after the comic before me was threatened by someone in the audience.
“I didn’t do my first full solo show until 2016 and I was so nervous, aged 46 and coming into a young person’s game, but I had a blast and the audiences were brilliant.”
Ronni added: “We are doing something very different with this show.
“Alistair came to see us doing a quick run through and said it was very me.
“We’ve tapped into the essence of ourselves and I hope people appreciate what we’re trying to do.”
Just Checking In, The Auditorium in Gilded Balloon at the Museum, until Aug 17
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