Review: Keeping Up Appearances ****

The audience, as one, appears to sit up a little straighter, and the few that were moved to applaud her entrance were almost embarrassed at having done so – Hyacinth would surely not approve of such an outburst.

She really is quite a creation.

There has been a tendency of late to transfer our favourite sitcoms to the stage. Yes, Minister, Dinnerladies and Steptoe and Son have arrived in our theatres with varying degrees of success.

Overtly commercial these shows may be, but when audiences enjoy them as much as this – and when they are as well performed and written as this – it's hard to be curmudgeonly about people being given the opportunity to watch their favourite screen characters come to life.

There is no doubt here that the producers have an eye on the budget, and Clarke's script, being set in an amateur dramatics theatre hall, gives them a clever way to scrimp on sets, but the craft and expense

is all in the cast and their lines.

Clarke's new script sees the long suffering neighbours of Hyacinth –Emmet and Liz – staging a local theatre show. Among the cast are Onslow, played with great girth by Gareth Hale, his wife, Daisy,

Rose and newcomer Mr Milson.

Hyacinth arrives and thrusts herself on the production, the resulting rehearsals a great catalyst for several very enjoyable set pieces.

Clarke is clearly a craftsman and his script contains flashes of post-modernism and wit – turning the auditorium of the Alhambra into the auditorium of the am dram stage, where the play within the play is set, is inspired.

Rachel Bell, as Hyacinth, is genuinely brilliant and it is not a criticism of the actors around her to say that it does end up feeling like a one-woman show at times.

Staged, perhaps to make money, this is still a show with plenty of heart and warmth.