Bouncers

John Godber's Bouncers has, since its first appearance in Edinburgh, in 1977, played to full houses and won critics' awards throughout the English-speaking world. There is no particular secret to its success.

It is, simply, a very funny farce set in the world of low-grade nightclubs, and it taps into the kind of vulgarity that makes us laugh and wince simultaneously - but the laughter usually wins.

Four male actors play multiple roles, usually in groups. They are feckless men setting off for a night on the town, during which they will blow their dole money on booze and birds.

Then they interpret the said birds, getting their hair done as a preamble to letting it down in various mating dances.

Primarily, they are a quartet of bouncers exercising over the pathetic customers of the night the kind of limited power inherent in their jobs.

The play is structured in a series of sketches to accommodate the goings-on of these groups, sometimes in isolation and at other times overlapping, as in the hilarious scene in which men dance with women.

Other roles are inserted, such as the smooth DJ and a couple of English visitors trying in vain to get into the club. The multiple interactions are very cleverly designed and keep the pace going.

Much of the material has the capacity for satire, a commentary on society, but this doesn't happen.

We are invited to laugh at, rather than with, the characters, and their working-class background is heavily emphasised.

Various crudities are stitched into the comic thrust where they might instead repel. Again, the explicit sex content is strictly for guffaws.

But it is all skilfully constructed and written, and provides the four actors with opportunities to flaunt their versatile wares.

Simon Delaney, Paul Roe, Les Martin and Kieran Hurley, directed by Anto Nolan, create a brilliant verbal and physical pastiche that insists on laughter, and I can't argue with that.

Runs until January 16th; to book, phone 01-4544472/3