Four star review of Drop the Dead Donkey The Reawakening at Leeds Grand Theatre

Thirty years on from the debut of Channel 4’s popular, ground-breaking sitcom Drop the Dead Donkey, set in the offices and studio of fictional TV news company Globelink News, comes a new stage version featuring most of the same cast.

All the familiar characters are here – slightly out of his depth editor George Dent (Jeff Rawle), his efficient deputy Helen Cooper (Ingrid Lacey), womanising sub-editor Dave Charnley (Neil Pearson), dour PA Joy Merryweather (Susannah Doyle) who is now a hilariously unsympathetic head of Human Resources, dodgy foreign correspondent Damien Day (Stephen Tompkinson), now confined to a wheelchair after being injured on a job, and self-aggrandising news presenter Sally Smedley (Victoria Wicks).

They have been gathered together by Gus Hedges (Robert Duncan), former CEO of Globelink News, who has been tasked with setting up a new GB News-style channel called Truth News, bankrolled by shady backers.

Andy Hamilton and Guy Jenkin’s writing is up to their usual high standards combining, spot-on, topical gags, deft characterisation and sharp, intelligent satire, all delivered with great skill by a wonderful ensemble of fine comic actors.

There are plenty of laughs here, including a disastrous launch night during which one national treasure is electrocuted and the reputation of another is besmirched, but the witty script also leaves space to mourn the sad demise of journalistic integrity, ethics and professional pride.

There is a powerful speech delivered by Tompkinson towards the end which serves as both a kind of redemption for Damien – this is the man who would place a child’s teddy bear at every disaster scene he reported on to add an extra level of poignancy – and a rallying cry to protect proper journalism.

It is a lovely nostalgic treat, but it also has some pertinent things to say about today’s politics and media landscape in which the truth is frequently a casualty and it’s interesting to note just how prescient the TV series was in terms of highlighting the direction in which news gathering and broadcasting was heading.

To April 13.