Listening to Tim Britton describe Forkbeard Fantasy’s latest show is rather like listening to someone detail a colourful dream – all “animatronic parrots”, “invisible artworks” and “cartoons that come to life”. He punctuates his sentences with an endearingly wild guffaw.

The “semi-autobiographical” piece, which merges animation, film, theatre, comedy, puppetry and even more besides, is set in the studios of a group of cutting-edge conceptual artists who’ve hit hard times and been forced to accept a commercial commission for a gallery in Milan. When even this founders, all is bleak. But then they receive a mysterious request for an invisible artwork.

“From then it takes off because they take on this impossible task and we do that live on stage,” Tim explains. “It’s that Emperor’s New Clothes thing and a humorous look at the highs and lows of creativity, the fads and fashions in the arts.

It’s mainly a visual piece but it’s a great comedy.”

Founded in 1974 by Tim and his brother Chris, Forkbeard have seen their share of art world successes and failures. They came from a performance art background “but moved into theatre because we’re up for comedy and enjoy being accessible”.

Still, Tim readily admits they’ve never fitted tidily into any one genre. “Our patron is Terry Gilliam and I know he suffers from the same thing with his films. They’re hugely imaginative and extremely strange in a way. Some people find them very hard to grasp, so you get a lot of reviewers who are desperately floundering around looking for a narrative or through-line. And yet people love being transported by good imagination, don’t they?”

The company is recognised as having pioneered the use of film in theatre (indeed, The Fall Of The House Of Usherettes, which the company brought to the Brighton Festival in 2005, explored the fantastical idea of “liquid film”).

“When we started in the 1970s hardly anyone was doing it at all,” he explains. “Or in British theatre at least. Abroad, they were playing with film as soon as it was invented. There were cartoonists who climbed in and out of their own films. This show has a lot of film and what appears to be live cartooning. There’s animation I do based around Edward Lear, who was one of the first cartoonists.”

The show is also a platform for some seriously exciting puppetry and Heath Robinson-esque gadgetry.

“I think one of the loveliest things in the show is a parrot that is semi animatronic and semi-puppet,” says Tim. “Edward Lear was really into parrots so that’s a nod to him. Dolly the parrot is quite important and there’s also a fly who goes to the private view as a fly on the wall.”

Suitable for “anyone over the age of seven”, the show promises to be a head-spinning visual treat.

*8pm, £12/£10, 01273 709709