Lindsay Posner’s sparkling production of Michael Frayn’s priceless backstage comedy was glorious when it opened at the Old Vic before Christmas and, joyously, it’s now even better on its hugely-deserved West End transfer.
It’s Stockton-on-Tees rather than the West End that awaits the cast of Nothing On, the creaky touring farce that forms Frayn’s ingenious play-within-a-play. We sit through Act One, Act One and Act One [NB yes, three Act Ones; that’s the joke], as we witness the chaos escalate steadily from the dress rehearsal to an actual performance before climaxing in all-out mutiny when the tour is on ‘its very last legs’.
I’ve never laughed so much in a theatre as during Act One, take one, when Robert Glenister’s witheringly sarcastic director attempts to get his motley crew, among them Celia Imrie’s cherishably dotty Dotty Otley to speak lines that bear some passing resemblance to the script. Yet Posner caps even this during the second Act One, set backstage during a disastrous show. He creates giddying crescendos of delight as his pitch-perfect – not to mention indefatigable – cast produce some of the most exquisite physical comedy ever as the Nothing On team plummets still further into unhelpful romantic intrigues. By Act Three, the bewildering number of plates of sardines that recur as props are being used as lethal weapons. A wonderful triumph.
Until June 30 (0844 871 7628, noisesoffwestend.com)
