With it’s highly theatrical tragi-comical main characters Uncle Monty, Withnail and Marwood, this re-written for the stage adaptation (Bruce Robinson) of the cult film Withnail and I is a sure fire winner at the Birmingham Rep. And any bastard who says otherwise will rue the day. Sherry?

The film is deliciously quotable. I have known people whose entire daily vocabulary is littered with Withnail lines and their week is ruined if they can’t fit in yet another viewing and a chance to ‘demand more booze’ or say they have ‘gone on holiday by mistake’. The play version will delight them as long as they can contain their delight and not feel an impulse to repeat the favourite lines heard onstage. This review is of a pretty much sold out Thursday matinee showing whose audience love it and thankfully enjoy it as a very funny play and not a smirking chance to show off their Withnail and I text knowledge.

There are many things to praise about this production not least the comical and compelling performances of Adonis Siddique (Marwood) and Robert Sheehan (Withnail) and especially Malcom Sinclair as the camp and predatory Uncle Monty. His crotch level dangling bunch of carrots are a visual innuendo delight. Most of the text from the film is left intact in this staged version and Bruce Robinson has added in some additional poignant text for Marwood. A second act Hamlet inspired sword fight brings roars of delight and applause from today’s audience. And is there a live chicken for their pot? You may wonder. Indeed there is and the dealing with and dispatching of the clucking bird with the beady eyes is hilarious. Just don’t let Jake the poacher threaten you with a dead fish!

The Withnail and I sets and costumes are a theatrical marvel created by Alice Power with integrated video design for the outdoors scenes by Akhila Krishnan. Whilst every effort has been made to illustrate all of the denizens and venues and grubby sub venues of the Withnail and I characters and story, even down to the urinals in the pub, there isn’t a bull chasing Marwood across the stage. If you desperately need to see a bull then trot off to the Birmingham New Street railway station before or post show where they have a magnificent modern statue of one. I digress…

It’s not just the three leads who make this show the gorgeous success it is: the Rep’s version superbly directed by Sean Foley, has a dynamic live band headed up by Sooz Kempner who also plays Miss Blenehassitt and a police woman; Morgan Philpott (band, Wanker in pub/Jake the poacher), Matt Devitt (band, farmer and colonel) and musical director Adam Sopp (band, geezer and policeman).

Adam Young gives us a darkly amusing skinny (off his head on drugs) Danny and Israel J Fredericks has a brief moment of glory as the Hari Rama chanting, Camberwell Carrot smoking Presuming Ed.

Robinson and Foley’s Withnail and I almost deserves a second viewing. If you are lucky enough to get a seat because the fecker is selling out faster than the tea and cakes at the Penrith Tearooms. Isn’t that right Miss Blenehassitt?

It is so chocka with fine details in the settings and costumes, the gut-busting farcical elements and the terrific acting. And the Rep even manage to make you believe in the dilapidated Jaguar car steaming out of the 1960s London and heading north in the rain to Uncle Monty’s country cottage.

This is my first in a long time visit to the Birmingham Repertory Theatre and it won’t be my last. The entire FOH staff are very welcoming and professional and the large Main House auditorium boasts steeply raked very comfortable seating that I imagine gives every single punter a fine view of the stage. I feel like I have gone on holiday but not by mistake. And I am not from London you know.

Withnail and I runs at Birmingham Rep until 25th May 2024.