THE woman at the cafe table next to us leaned forward and admitted she had no idea what play she was going to see. She just knew that Natalie Imbruglia was making her stage debut in whatever it was.

Hardly the type of endorsement required for a rare end-on production by prolific master of contemporary humour Alan Ayckbourn.

My own quip to my wife on the matter was that it would be fine as long as Imbruglia didn’t sing. She did... opening with her character’s old school song from St Gertrude’s, and later adding quite a few more choruses (both traditional and rude versions).

The soap and screen star and pop singer flapped around a little too enthusiastically establishing the role of Nikki, a battered wife making a new start with Hamish (Edward Bennett), and could never quite lose her Australian accent. Ayckbourn’s uncanny ability to present his audience with uncomfortable references to their own lives, swiftly sauntered towards sex-starved Hamish realising that workaholic Barbara (Claire Price) is a much better bet than frigid Nikki . The cleverness of displaying the action in three floors of flats (where you can only see top flat bedroom action at lower leg height, the basement at head height and Barbara’s flat as centre stage) was inspired by Clint Eastwood’s film In The Line Of Fire.

The early acting award goes to basement tenant Gilbert (Simon Gregor), who is secretly infatuated with Barbara, but overdoes the Dutch courage and is more amusingly incoherent than a Jamaica Inn extra. This is surpassed by one of the best comedy fights I’ve seen on stage between Price and Bennett.

Promoting this prized piece from 1996 to today’s A-list theatres is still a stretch and the cast found themselves having to work hard for every guffaw and ripple of applause. One thing Imbruglia must do for love is to find that inner dramatic actor.

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