Where’s a goofy, flat-chested shrew when you need one?

Ray Cooney, the master of farce, is back. These days he’s in the modest Menier rather than the wonderful West End. His 1984 caper, Two Into One, opens with Richard, a starchy Tory minister, plotting an affair with a sexy blonde researcher, Jennifer. Richard decides to attempt a daring double bluff by booking Jennifer into a hotel in Westminster where his gullible wife Pamela is already installed for the weekend. Pamela meanwhile starts an indiscretion with Richard’s bungling junior, George, but their dalliance is compromised when Jennifer’s husband Ted turns up and is mistaken for George’s ‘boyfriend’, whom George has invented to conceal his affair with Pamela. Improbable? You bet. But the play’s effervescent silliness banishes one’s disbelief to the sidelines.

The cast are good to watch and Cooney, who directs his own script, plays a cameo role as a hapless old waiter who likes practising kung fu and keeps hoofing spare guests in the knackers. He even takes a spill on stage and lands in a heap of sprawling body parts. And he’s 81 years old. There are a couple of ‘buts’ about this show. Josefina Gabrielle, as Pamela, is far too beautiful and stylish to be a credible rejectee. Richard’s wife should be a horsey frump, pushing 60, and sheathed head to foot in prickly tweeds. His decision to risk his career by swapping his lovely spouse for a younger replica who only just surpasses her in desirability seems perverse. And a simmering little bundle of provocation like Pamela wouldn’t fall for a waddling misfit like George. Not in a million years. My guess is that Cooney’s eye for the ladies got the better of him in the audition room and he cast Gabrielle when he really needed a goofy, flat-chested shrew.