Cynics might suggest my main reason for being at Liverpool’s Royal Court Theatre last night was to ogle Suzanne Collins’ long slender legs.

Well that’s because they only think they know me.  I am of course, ever appreciative of a shapely pair of pins, but I’m also a sucker for a good serving of raucous scouse comedy.

And that was my main reason for attending the second-night performance of  Drew Quaile’s The Salon.  Two and a half hours of having the lovely Suzanne cavort in a very short beautician’s tunic just a few feet from my seat in the stalls, was just an added bonus.

On all counts, the evening definitely did not disappoint.

An hour before curtain-up, Jayne and I enjoyed an excellent meal served at our table in the Royal Court’s unique “cabaret-style” stalls.  Good honest simple fayre, beautifully prepared and presented. Fantastic quality, especially when you consider they serve 150 meals in forty-five minutes! A nicely chilled bottle of rosé from the theatre bar was the perfect accompaniment.

Then within seconds of the lights going down there was non-stop laughter throughout the entire performance.

Set in the “Curl Up and Dye” salon, the play give a hilarious insight to the entwined love lives (and the lack thereof) of the hairdressers, beautician, and their customers  and revolves around the break-up of the salon’s two gay owners.

Other than that, there was no real story-line as such.  But then, none was needed.  In fact there was no room for one.  Quail’s script was bursting with humour and innuendo.  And under the genius direction of Bob Eaton, the cast delivered some of the funniest performances I have seen.

Lynne Fitzgerald was hilarious as the scissor-happy brazen hussy and Roy Brandon’s portrayal of an hysterical love-forsaken queen was a magnificent combination of drama and slapstick.

And the acting in late-night drunken scene was so convincing, I actually found myself worrying that the actors might end up falling off the cleverly constructed elevated stage that was the apartment above the salon.

Can I recommend it?  Absolutely!

If anybody can find fault with this terrific comedy, they’d be splitting hairs.  Go and see it for yourself and I promise you, it’s your sides that’ll be splitting!

The Salon’s month-long run at the Royal Court Theatre, Liverpool, ends November 28th

The band struck up. The curtain rose. The dancers were up and singing.

I couldn’t help noticing that the youngest were around twelve. And during that first energetic number I surmised that this would be a very different production from the raucous comedies we are used to seeing at Liverpool’s Royal Court Theatre.

After the first number, Royal Court Regular Andrew Scofield (remember Scully in Boys from the Black Stuff?) entered stage right. Drew is normally cast as the archetype scouse scally who gets withdrawal symptoms if he goes more than two sentences without uttering the “F” word.

In this first scene he played an extremely short-sighted lolly-pop man on the school crossing and having suffered a tirade of abuse from the “remedial” class teenagers he was heard to shout “and you can Eff-off and all”.  That, I imagined, would be to limit of the swearing on this show.

Woohoo! How wrong can you be?!

Our Day Out is a bang-up-to-date rewrite of Willy Russell’s original comedy.

Now a full blown musical, it tells of a school trip to Wales for the remedial class of a Liverpool School – and the great playwrite acknowledges in his script that the “Queen’s English” has very little to do with the vocabulary of today’s teens.

Andrew Schofield was, as ever, brilliant – both as the half wit school crossing man in the opening scene and as the staid, establishment, strait-laced, teacher who “invited” himself on the school trip to the horror of the pupils and of the progressive class teachers who’d organised it.

In these roles, Gillian Hardie and Bradley Clarkson were truly great. And you could be excused for imagining that Holly Quin Ankrah was chosen for her role as the young student teacher purely because of the way she filled out that orange swimsuit in the beach scene. But her singing, dancing and acting prowess demonstrated exactly why she quickly progressed from her five years on Grange Hill to the principle role in Rock Rivals and more recently as Geena in Shameless.

Michael Starke too (Brookside, The Royal and Jerry Morton in Corrie) exhibited perfect comedic timing, a really good singing voice and surprising light-footedness as the cheerful chubby bus driver.

My standing ovation last night, however, was for the extremely talented young actors and dancers who played the errant schoolies. I’ve always felt the Royal Court’s success stems from casting “to type”. That is why Drew is such a favourite. Hire a scouser to play a scouser. These scouse kids certainly came up with the goods. So believable they were as the characters they portrayed.

Their energy and exuberance was matched only by the professionalism of their performance. Their singing and acting voices were as good as you would find on any stage in Britain – including the West End.

And I was struck by the irony of the task facing the choreographers and stage directors.  They had to discipline a couple of dozen energetic hormonal teenagers into successfully portraying a couple of dozen wayward and unruly hormonal teenagers. Type-casting? No. This was the result of such hard work executed with the enthusiasm and energy of youth. Flawless performances that left you laughing and crying and wanting to be that young again yourself.

I’m so glad I am not a professional reviewer. For I’d feel I had to tell you to look out for the exceptional singing and dancing talents of young Rebecca Cumings, or Chris Mason’s accurate portrayal of a love-struck Jack-the-Lad, or…

In truth, every single one of those talented youngsters delivered fantastic performances and fully deserved the standing ovation they received from a Tuesday night packed house.

I can fully recommend you go and see Our Day Out. The youngsters, the cast, the musicians, the production team and the most warm and welcoming venue that Liverpool has to offer, truly do justice to the unrivalled observational humour of Willy Russell.

Our Day Out will be Your Night Out to Remember. You’ve got until October 17th to catch the bus.  Whatever else you do – don’t miss it!

Read a shortened version of this along with other reviews on the Liverpool Echo Website: http://tinyurl.com/willyrussell

The set for the “The Flags” is impressive.  Almost as imaginative as the grassy knoll created for the indoor outdoor pop festival “Eight Miles High” last summer.  Over ten tons of sand was shipped up from Cornwall to construct the beach scene for the Royal Court Theatre’s current presentation.

That, unfortunately, is where the comparison ends.

Certainly for the first forty minutes of the show, the red flags were definitely flying. Prophetically so. That beach was a definite no-go area!

The last five minutes of the first half were rescued – just – by the talented and likable Andrew Schofield as he and his “lifeguard” partner bungled an attempt to resuscitate the woman they had just dragged from the sea only to jump for joy as the “kiss of life” practice dummy they had brought out for a quick refresher course, was seen to be breathing!

That scene was a moment of masterful comedy and during the break I had high hopes the play would gain some momentum. Sadly, that was to be the only real bit of entertainment in a production that received but a luke-warm reception from the first-night audience.

So where did it all go wrong? Why was it that, in this synagogue of scouse humour, a show starring one of Liverpool’s finest comedy actors should have been such a flop?

The answer lays in the question.  It wasn’t scouse humour, it was Irish humour – acted with bad Irish accents.  I was sat “at the water’s edge” and yet there was much of the dialogue I couldn’t properly comprehend due to the rushed presentation.  Much of the subtle humour was completely lost on me and indeed most of the Royal Court Audience.

Can the show be saved?  Well yes.  Even at this late stage, if they were to drop the Irish accents and set “The Flags” on a Merseyside or Lancashire beach and let Andrew Schofield do what he does best. Let him be scouse. And the rest of the cast too. Then Yes.  The Flags could see out its four week run with some dignity.  It could be done It really could – even at this late stage.  If the directors had the courage to make these few simple changes, they could turn this thing around. And think of the publicity they would receive for making such a brave decision!

As it stands, however, I cannot find it in me to recommend The Flags to anyone.  And that saddens me.  For since I first discovered this magical theatre some eighteen months ago, this is the first time I have come away disappointed.

The Hairy Photographer

(Half scouse, living in North Wales)

Read an edited version of this review on the Liverpool Echo website

That’s all I ask.  Just listen for five minutes and forty seconds.  It’s not much out of a whole lifetime is it?

Put on your headphones or turn up your speakers and go to isaacbirchall.com.

Listen to Dreamer.

Then if you like, listen to Image through my words.  And then Same. And then…  Hell it’s not up to me.  Listen to them all!

Back in the sixties I played the Cavern, the Iron Door and many other of those iconic Merseyside venues, I trod the same boards as the Beatles (sadly not at the same time), the Searchers, Freddie, Jerry, the Big Three,  and all the other big names of the day.

But if I’d had a quarter of the talent of this young man I’d have really gone places.

It was fun while it lasted.

Now it’s his turn.  If you like his music, tell people.

…but listen!