Slow start, but worth the wait

IT is probably a couple of decades since I last saw French playwright Marc Camoletti’s farce: until a couple of years ago it had long been consigned to church hall status.

But when award-winning director Matthew Warchus took it on, the show — officially the most popular French play ever — was dazzlingly revived to be proclaimed the funniest show in London, ditto on Broadway, and is now in the third week of a lengthy national tour.

So it was a shame that the tremendously hard-working cast went through tortuously energetic routines for a house culled to a quarter of its capacity by the weather.

Not that this seemed to have much effect on the players: the show really is hilarious — if you can maintain interest through the slow build-up of the first act, and only if you remain an unreconstructed lover of sexist Sixties comedy. Which in my case is lucky . . .

The story is simple, as with every farce: a playboy Parisian (Martin Marquez, late of “The Bill” and “Hotel Babylon”) juggles three “fiancees”, German (Josephine Butler), Italian (Thaila Zucchi, of “Skins”) and American (Sarah Jayne Dunn — Mandy in “Hollyoaks”), working respectively for Lufthansa, Alitalia and TWA (ask your dad).

His cunning plan means he gets truly beautiful girls who are always flying off somewhere. The three are kept apart by virtue of world airline timetables.

All of which works well, with the help of his truculent housekeeper — played by Susie Blake of Corrie fame — until his long-lost provincial cousin (Martin’s brother John) comes to call.

As in most farce, Camoletti gives us a slow and slightly repetitious first half, as crises come and are averted. Only in act two is the real glory of the comedy revealed, with doors flying, bodies likewise and some tightly-controlled business from all the players.

Though Martin Marquez plays the playboy juggler, in fact it is his brother who has the bulk of the comedy as their house of cards tumbles.

His laconic sweep through much of the second half is made all the funnier by the device of his character having a Welsh accent. It’s amazing what a difference this makes.

Then again he gets the rewards: a lengthy snogging session with Sarah Jayne Dunn for a start