When I was a little boy in the early 1960s my Dad made me a model railway on a base board the size of a double bed which included a couple of routes for the trains to travel around the electrified tracks courtesy of a dark green transformer which gave off a low hum and sometimes a whiff of hot metal.

Every birthday or Christmas I would beg for a new train and carriages and various items of model railway furniture like rural stations, tunnels, signals, signal boxes, fences for plastic horses to poke their curious heads over and little model people. I made appropriate size model trees using match sticks and cotton wool dyed green. I loved my model railway and learned through bitter experience not to put my tongue on the Hornby Dublo electrified tracks to see what would happen. Similarly not to stick a pencil into the electric plug hole. The loud bang and shock put paid to me doing both those silly tricks. I did become quite adept at making chuffing train noises and poop pooping as my model train approached a siding or train platform. Innocent days. However, looking back I think my Dad made the train set equally for his pleasure as he was always there looking over my shoulder and taking over while I played trains and it was the happiest I remember seeing him be. Railway red was and continues to be, my favourite colour.

Most Saturdays we would take to trip into town to Derby Museum and Art Gallery where I would stand for ages transfixed by the glories of a massive train set built on multiple levels with several tracks and model villages reconstructed with enormous skills and accuracy. The sight of a train entering a long model tunnel section and emerging out the other end sent the boy in me into paroxysms of pure model train delight. There were multiple trains to see sitting in sidings or moving around and possibly even a replica model Derby Railway Station circa 1950. Then one day we went to the museum, comme normal, up through the art gallery and by the Roman coin collections, the stuffed animals and birds cases and the glass fronted boxed in space where the model railway stood. Yet this time the space was empty… completely empty. Not even a jaunt to the real Derby Midland Railway Station and its real steam and modern diesel trains could console me. I was devastated.

Now imagine how I might feel as an adult model train set builder having spent months and years and practically the whole of my leisure time with a club of fellow skilled model rail enthusiasts and makers to discover that vandals had broken in to our model railway venue and smashed the living daylights out of all of our hard work. So begins the story of William Ivory’s stage play The Market Deeping Model Railway Club running at Nottingham Playhouse until Saturday 25th July.

Shocked at the destruction of their model railway in 2019 by vandals the club must gather their strengths and attempt to rebuild the model railway. No easy task. William Ivory has fictionalised some of the characters names but the cast we see on the Nottingham Playhouse stage give us a very believable bunch of eccentric and likable East Midlands based Model Railway Club membership bringing warmth and wit to this high stakes drama. If ever there was a stage celebration of community and friendship through mutual deep love of a hobby, this play is it. If you like very human wry wit dramas such as The Detectorists, you will love this.

Adam Penford directs a fantastic cast comprised of Adrian Scarborough (Graham), Deka Walmsley (Ken), James Bradshaw (Neil), Lucy Briars (Linda), Geoffrey Beevers (George), Paul Bradley (Jerry), Babatunde Aléshé (Jordan) and Matt Bardock (Chris). All offer very relatable performances. In a connected ‘how the play was developed’ video Penford says “When I first read the script it really made me cry with laughter and I started to think why do people choose to make little miniature reproductions of the world. There’s real drama, some twists and turns and laugh out loud comedy” Writer William Ivory says that the play isn’t just about model railways but more why we club together and why we British particularly have clubs and why we are world famous for having such membership of clubs.

We get to know the characters and their frustrations, motivations, relationships and secrets through William Ivory’s astute and honest writing in both halves of the play and so gripped and invested are we in their personalities and foibles that when one of them critically blurts out what they believe to be a shocking truth about another member (often mistakenly so) that the audience gasp out loud and envisage big troubles ahead. So loaded is this world premiere story, based on real life events, with genuine humour and unexpected dramatic moments, that to tell too much would reveal a long list of spoilers. I can assure you that you will laugh a lot, have a few moments of quiet reflection and possibly head to the internet when you get home to seek out how you can build model railways in your attic or the garden shed. Pretty soon you will learn to know your flanges from your bogies and fiddle yards.

As well as the excellent and naturalistic acting, the set design (designer Soutra Gilmour) and model train related projections (Jon Driscoll) are a wonder to behold. William Ivory’s writing and research for The Market Deeping Model Railway Club just goes to prove what an extraordinary local stage writing talent he is and a proper champion of theatre based on working class lives.

So, make tracks, book your tickets for this first class theatrical experience. It is chuff chuffin’ brilliant!

The Market Deeping Model Railway Club is kindly sponsored by LNER.