ANARCHIC, wonderfully wacky and highly infectious – that's my dramatic diagnosis for The Royal, a new production that has a healthy life ahead.
This latest Royal Court, home-grown comedy is a triumph from start to finish with plenty of visual gags, slapstick and cracking dialogue.
This two-hour show makes Carry On Nurse seem like Panorama.
Multi-talented Lindzi Germain and her accomplished good friends on and off stage - Lynn Francis and Angela Simms (pictured, below) are a formidable theatrical trio.
Not only did they write it, but they perform in it.
A dream team to look out for.
I look forward to more creations like this.
All three know their audience and it shows.
Rehearsals must have been a lot of fun judging by the slick end result.
The non-stop belly laughs from the audience (me included) said it all.
The story revolves around the last day of the Royal Hospital as it flatlines and makes way for a new building.
In ward 8X they are mopping up with just two patients left before they transfer over.
Before the show begins Lindzi, a great stand up comedienne in her own right, takes to the stage with her own warm-up act welcoming the audience.
Production still from The Royal. Picture: Bond Media
It is a master stroke of engagement.
An astute piece of theatre where she has the Court's loyal supporters in the palm of her hands even before curtain up.
The Court have their own in house pre-publicity guide … the Can I Bring My Gran-O-Meter which states that the show has some swearing, nudity and general rudeness.
Happily, it has no political sermonsing.
This warm play has much more.
There are plenty of surprises and I won't give the game away.
Special effects and comedy are phrases seldom used in any review but here designer Mark Walters excels himself with a brilliantly-inventive set and some jaw-dropping moments.
And full praise to much in-demand director Cal McCrystal who always gets the best out scripts and the actors.
Lindzi plays street-wise yet sensitive tea lady Tereasa McDonald.
I have met many like her when I was in a Royal bed for various opetrations.
Nurse Florence Davis is obsessed by TV doctor dramas.
Angel Simms plays her with her usual confidence and she provides one early sight gag that brought the house down before the bulldozers on stage do their work.
And Lynn Francis another dependable Court star is manic Mo McGuire the mortuary worker.
She is more deadpan than bedpan.
Her comic timing is spot on throughout.
Production still from The Royal. Picture: Bond Media
One man who gives that theatrical term 'corpsing' a new meaning is Phillip Heseltine, son of our own Les Dennis.
He, as Mrs Llewellyn (no I haven’t been on medication), leaves himself and the audience speechless.
Court stalwarts Alan Stokes as Walter Bush, a pompous scout master and Danny O'Brien as dim construction worker Paddy O’Shaughnessy give their usual 100 per cent.
There's even an on-screen appearance from Granada's golden anchor girl Lucy Meacock playing herself.
The Royal has moments of tenderness amid the fast-paced action.
There are plenty of laughing gasps (see wat I did there – it’s catching) and very funny shocks.
Lindzi's vocal and facial asides add to the surgical surrealism on offer.
We have all been sick of late – the EU has zapped our attention spans and it will continue to do so.
So if you want to escape with a show that is very much alive and kicking then I prescribe you book into The Royal immediately.
Five stars - a terrific Tonic
It's at The Royal Court until July 16. Tickets from the box office on 0151 709 4321.
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