Reprehensible **** 1/2

This series sees the return of Milton’s productions to the extremely successful ‘Hellfire’ format. His success seems to lie not simply in the near the knuckle humour and brilliant one-liners, but in the depth of the characters combined with his ability to develop the appropriate and novel dialogue for each character.

Frank (Damon Lockwood) although being married to Jeanette (Kate McGinniskin) still has not passed the teenage hormonally-challenged stage. Jeanette is thinking of leaving him, when a phone call advises her that her sister Eloise (Sarah Fay) has a brain tumour. With very sick people, just as at funerals, the more one tries to offer a few sympathetic words, the worse the situation becomes. Perry (Mark Storen), Frank’s best friend, is ‘wet’, gay and the perfect scapegoat. In an attempt to make her husband jealous, Jeanette threatens to spend the night with the young, eager virginal pizza boy Lance (Ben Russell) and later with Deshawn (Sean Walsh) whom she meets at a night club.

As always the audience gasps as Milton takes them to the edge of obscene and then just pulls back in time. This series of shows is for the broadminded who appreciate well written humour. With such a brilliant cast is hardly necessary to say how beautifully the delivery of the script is. Loads of belly laughs.

Following the revival of the farce and ‘Fawlty Towers’ I can see these plays being played around the country, by local groups, to great acclaim. Great fun, highly recommended but the seats are very limited.