PLAYHOUSE THEATRE

Our verdict: WE LOVE IT!  5 stars.

If you're soldiering through the credit crunch blues, make your way to the Playhouse Theatre - absolutely no-one can watch Terry Johnson's production of La Cage aux Folles without feeling cheered beyond imagination.

From the moment the ruffled pink curtain lifts on the stage at the Riviera drag club which lends its name to this 1983 Jerry Herman/Harvey Fierstein show, one is transported to a world of spangles and sequins where a chorus of fake birds  (in every sense of the phrase) leads us through the story of nightclub owner Georges and his longterm partner and transvestite star of the show, Albin - and the high jinks that follow when Georges' son Jean-Michel brings home his fiancée's ultra-conservative parents to meet them.

The story is an old one, and against the present day backdrop of civil unions, it seems like it hasn't as much of an edge as it did when it was played to Broadway audiences still reeling from the scale of the AIDS crisis of the  1980s. Nonetheless, it remains a captivating and entirely uplifting celebration of love enduring beyond familiarity and ennui, and has been warmly received by a packed house night after night  since beginning its run at The Playhouse in October. 

Douglas Hodge as Albin is faultless. From his first whinging utterances which bear just a hint of Alan Carr, he is everyone's sweetheart, swinging between fretful sulkiness as Albin and devastating stage presence as Zaza. Without a doubt, Hodge's is the most powerful performance and it's worth seeing the show for him alone.

Denis Lawson, who replaced Philip Quast as Georges after the production moved from its original run at the Menier Chocolate Factory, is every inch the tender and devoted partner, propping up Albin in his moments of insecurity and doubt in so touching a manner it brought a lump to my throat more than once.

This is the show that gave us the anthemic song I Am What I Am, and Albin's rendition of it  - having been told that Jean-Michel would like him to stay out of sight so as not to offend his fiancée's ultra-conservative parents - is utterly magnificent. The audience's cheers threatened to bring the house down. 

Jason Pennycooke as Albin's sweetly vituperative  maid and Alicia Davies and Stuart Neal as the fresh young lovers round off a thoroughly delightful supporting cast. And through it all leap the 'notorious and dangerous' Les Cagelles, the long-limbed and deliciously feminine troupe of rather masculine singer-dancers, executing Lynne Page's heart-stopping choreography with electric vigour.

Tim Shortall's set design must receive an honourable mention too; not least for the giant glittering aviary which sets the scene for the company's performance of the show's eponymous song.