Inside No.9 Stage Fright @ Edinburgh Playhouse

If things had gone according to plan, this review would have been posted back in March when I should've attended Inside No.9 - Stage / Fright at the Wyndham Theatre, in what was my first ever trip to London.

On that occasion, I suffered a bout of sickness only hours before we were due to leave the hotel for the theatre, and therefore missed that performance. Gutted? Yes, just a little bit, especially since there were "no plans to tour the play" as both Shearsmith and Pemberton declared.

The little fibbers.

When they then announced a UK tour of the play, I was delighted (but also a little annoyed that I'd spent a lot of money for the London trip, thinking it was my only chance to see it). Regardless, I bought tickets for the last Edinburgh performance on 29th November, and now we get to the part of the review that you actually want to read.

Obviously, some spoilers ahead. Final warning, etc.

We started with a witty, cautionary tale for inconsiderate audience members who talk throughout a performance - in this case, a performance of Hamlet - or use their phones or even laptops (sometimes even at the same time!). That it's Reece's character who dealt with these nuisances in a deadly way seems quite fitting, with his faux 'angry man' persona.

Steve and Reece then took to the stage again, as themselves, where they explained that the scene we'd just witnessed was based on a true story, and that a spirit called 'Bloody Belle' haunts the Playhouse. I have a feeling Belle gets about a bit and haunts every venue on this tour!

Then we were treated to a live performance of Bernie Clifton's Dressing Room, the much-lauded Series 4 episode that bagged Steve a BAFTA for Best Male Performance in a Comedy Programme. While much of it was the same as the televised episode, there were a few changes to keep it fresh. Some were small, like an extended version of the coat stand and sleeve mime. Others were a whole entire sketch involving wrongly kidnapping a guest star, which was a highlight of an already highly enjoyable evening. The tour has been going on for a while now that I think most people are aware of the surprise guest star who changes from venue to venue. On the evening we went to see the play, Sanjeev Kholi, best known as Naveed from Scottish sitcom, Still Game, was unveiled as the kidnapped celebrity. There was a fair bit of corpsing during this section, mostly by Reece and Sanjeev. At one point, Sanjeev came out of a wardrobe too early before rushing back in, which got a huge laugh from the audience and Reece reduced to a fit of giggles.

That the Inside No.9 duo were dressed as the robbers from Series 1's A Quiet Night In wasn't the only nod to past series. As well as that, and the aforementioned Bernie Clifton, we got a brief but hilarious nod to the very first episode, Sardines, as well as an appearance of the Hare, a small statue which could be spotted in every televised episode. Quite apt it also was shown here too via a screen.

After the hilarity of the kidnappers, we then returned to the remainder of Bernie Clifton's Dressing Room with that gut-punch twist (though perhaps now a slight pat on the belly since the audience knew what was coming). A well-timed jump scare at the end brought Act 1 to a close

Act 2 is where it got gory (but not 18-rated, horrifically-so) with eyeballs hanging down from faces and a character, under a form of hypnosis, cutting off his own leg. This formed the play-within-a-play part of the show, and the audience was reminded once more about Bloody Belle. The use of a screen was put to great, tense effect as we followed an out-of-shot actress in the bowels of the theatre, alone with only the undead as company.

As the play ended and the cast stood in line in front of the audience for the curtain call, something was amiss. Reece looked a little different than usual. A bit of gaslighting by Steve was met with much mirth from the Playhouse crowd, before we were left with the comedy partners alone onstage. There was something they'd forgotten...

Of course, haven given such prominence to the Clifton episode earlier, they couldn't end the show without a theatrical song-and-dance number with the entire cast performing an extended, adapted version of Tears of Laughter from Bernie Clifton. Inside every comedy horror writer is a showman in white top hat and tails bursting to get out, it seems. I liked the fact that the jokes they told as asides during the song were about each other, Steve and Reece. A reminder of the real-life writing partnership as well as friendship these two have continued since meeting over 30 years ago. Their friendship will last another 30 years, I'm sure, but I do hope we get a few more years to enjoy further works by these talented pair.

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