When Ian Saville first started performing this show in the Eighties he was the picture of socialism, all unkempt facial hair and witty anti-Thatcherite longing.

Apart from shedding the beard and adding some grey hairs, very little seems to have changed tonight.

Eccentricity darts in his eyes, complemented by a murderous smile and dodgy waistcoat.

For the first ten minutes he's nothing short of endearing, bumbling his way through a self-deprecating and uncertain diagnosis of the piece's history, his self-conscious depersonalisation a truly Brechtian product.

Most of his brilliant tricks revolve around symbolic themes such as class, capitalist idiocy and alienation, but sadly he wastes our attention on knowingly incompetent ventriloquism with a dummy of Brecht yoinked from a suitcase.

This scripting dissolved the charm his more spontaneous ramblings had uncovered, but it's not every day you see a magician trying to change the world.

  • Until Wednesday. Call 01273 709709