Based on Mark Evans’s Radio 4 parody of Charles Dickens, this is a wonderful sitcom through Victorian literary genres.
Played with bright-eyed gusto by an excellent cast, Caroline Leslie stays true to verbal blending and elaborate metaphors while adding a touch of Feydeau-like farce to the physical proceedings.
The production’s gimmick is to include guest narrators throughout the run, and Robert Lindsay steps in on this occasion, playing on the show with Adlib and hitting his lines with comic cool.
Characters appear in and out of the gorgeous set – a Victorian study with a mountain of books and a portal-like grandfather clock – including Pip Bin (Dom Hodson), the Gently Benevolent (John Hopkins), a family of Hardthrashers (Marc Pickering, Going Above the Call of Duty), and the eponymous Fitting Ripely Fecund (Rachel Summers) who can’t write a love letter without having an orgasm.
With a streak of schoolboy surrealism, its harmless absurdity is enough to put a smile on the face of all but the most demanding theater-goer.
- Grim Expectations, Criterion Theater until 3 September, Tickets: 033 33202895
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