New Producers still appeals

Seeing The Producers with a new cast is like arriving at a glittering party just as the VIPs have left. It is still an appealing do but somehow there's the nagging feeling that it was better earlier.

The latest biggish draw is The League of Gentlemen's Reece Shearsmith as Leo Bloom. His impish wannabe impresario owes more to Matthew Broderick's bashful Broadway incarnation than Lee Evans' manic London version.

Shearsmith neatly captures the adenoidal angst of the security blanket-clutching Bloom and is a surprisingly deft hoofer when duetting with Ulla (Rachel McDowall).

Less effective is Cory English, whose chiselling Max Bialystock lacks Nathan Lane's charisma, class and eyebrows.

Under further scrutiny the plot is potholed too. If Bialystock is intent on staging a flop, why cast the stupendously sexy Ulla?

And aren't Springtime For Hitler's sex-crazed geriatric backers concerned about bankrolling an extended fan letter to the Fuhrer?

Ultimately this production has to rely on the strength of the infectious, near-parodic music, snappy wit and Mel Brooks' unreconstructed vulgarity to carry the long night.

It pulls it off, but by a whisker.

The Producers