Since the death of her mother, Katherine has experienced an emotional void. Perhaps unwisely, she has chosen to fill it with a team of builders, whose brief is to transform her north London flat into a tranquil haven with Moorish touches.
But for three months the cocky contractors have held Katherine to ransom in her own front room, eating her food, subjecting her to inane chatter and even, she suspects, reading her diary. So what has she got to complain about? At least they don't knock a big hole in the wall and bugger off completely.
Murray Gold's comedy elicits a warm response from a satisfied audience (perhaps in the spirit of enjoying other people's property disasters on TV). But as an extremely lengthy expression of an exceedingly slight idea, there are problems with the piece - and I'm afraid they could be structural.
To start with, there are several top-heavy monologues causing your dramatic momentum to subside; then there's a definite leakage of extraneous dialogue and a fault with the emotional thermostat that causes everything to get overheated in the last quarter of an hour. And I'd definitely want to knock through and make it a two-acter.
Ian Brown's production papers over these cracks quite effectively, however, and the acting is sound. Sophie Ward's Katherine is suitably oppressed and Christopher Eccleston's jokey Jakey goes down a storm, though I wonder about the indulgence of playing his longer speeches like a standup routine.
Patrick Brennan is pudgy and persecuted as the foreman Leo, and there's good work from Oliver Wood as a hapless juvenille who's clearly a few tools short of a full kit. It's not perfect: but then flawless comedies are as hard find as a decent electrician.
· Until April 24. Box office: 0113-213 7700.
