Robots win the laughs

The Jonny Wilkinson factor has even affected this year's RSC Christmas show, which has a slow-motion rugby sequence long before the wretchedly unathletic Beast makes his entrance. It is one of many unusual touches in a production that brings together flirtatious robots, a witch who's a meditation bore and spring-onion-flavoured ice cream as it tells the age-old story of a girl attracted to a man who's a bit of an animal.

This is not the first outing for writer and director Laurence Boswell's ludic but far from ludicrous retelling of the myth. A model of theatrical elegance and sophisticated fun - bar the fart jokes - it began life in 1996 at the Young Vic, and on the whole has survived the lengthy and demanding train journey to the proscenium arch at Stratford-upon-Avon.

How do you create a sufficiently gripping monster for children weaned on Jurassic Park and accustomed to filmic special effects that send imaginations running for their P45s? That question of what might entertain a 21st century child raises its head repeatedly over the Christmas season, and Adam Levy's Beast - who looks slightly like a balding reptile with more than its fair share of horns - exhibits a winning pathos and humorous boorishness that largely compensate for a slight deficiency in the being fearsome department.

There are plenty of visual games to entertain parents who feel they know the story too well, whether it's the Cocteau-style moment, when luminous blue candelabras are wielded by anonymous figures in black, or the glamorous male dancer with pierced nipples who represents the horse that whisks Beauty back to her family.

Stylised choreography is just one of the effects that Boswell deploys to emphasise the theatricality of his vision, and for all those moments when children must work to imagine - say - the Beast's enchanted palace, they are equally rewarded both with slapstick and high comedy.

Sophie Winkleman's jealously selfish Veronique is a wicked treat, well matched by Dorothy Atkinson's engagingly stupid Marie-Claire. And Aoife McMahon's flame-haired Beauty does well enough as a heroine in an age where being virginal and a Daddy's girl win few points for aspiring young women.

In a consistently clever but occasionally underpowered evening, it is, however, the robots who win the biggest laughs. Whatever next? Snow White and the Seven Photocopiers?

Beauty And The Beast