Jeeves and Wooster in Perfect Nonsense, Theatre by the Lake.

I'll admit that I approach this from a very biased perspective: I have loved Wodehouse for many, many years.

His ability to turn a phrase is up there with Golding, Greene and Orwell. He just covers slightly different situations.

So it didn't take much persuasion to send me biffing along to Keswick to see the opener of the new summer season

The play takes The Code of the Woosters as the starting point and then takes slight liberties with the story and great liberties with the audience and how you should stage a play.

There's no such thing as a 'fourth wall' here, we're all in the soup alongside Bertie every step of the way.

We're all in on the fact that this is a play within a very amateurish play and there's plenty of winks and looks of horror directed at the audience.

Thomas Richardson makes a warm-hearted Bertie – a well-meaning innocent all goggle-eyed boyish charm and winning grin.

But it is Theo Fraser Steele as Jeeves and James Duke as his fellow manservant Seppings who impress most.

They're responsible for a headspinning series of character and costume changes in a story that includes theft, deception, newt impersonation, fiances and the only funny fascist in history.

More refr e shing than a good cuppa, PG's quips are pure gold, but they are matched by some brilliant comic timing and athletic manoeuvring by the pair.

This isn't a production just for Wodehouse fans, it's for anyone who has the slightest sense of humour and the slightest shard of a funnybone.

Wodehouse once said:" Everything in life that’s any fun, as somebody wisely observed, is either immoral, illegal or fattening."

Not so in this case.

Mark Green