PATRICK MARMION: Brassy Eighties romp still has a caustic edge

Letter to Brezhnev (Liverpool's Royal Court until October 17): Four stars out of five  

More than 40 years have passed since the rough and ready Liverpool romcom Letter To Brezhnev charmed critics and became a left-field box office hit.

Now, the film's writer Frank Clarke has turned it into a stage play. And I'm pleased to report that its two leading ladies – Teresa and Elaine, the 'copping- off mates' from Kirkby who pull a couple of Soviet sailors on a wild night out – are still world-beaters.

The low-budget 1985 movie launched the career of local actress Margi Clarke as party girl Teresa, who has a miserable job gutting chickens and just wants a laugh and a romp in the sack.

Elaine (originally played by Alexandra Pigg), is looking for more: romance and an escape from a life on the dole.

But her dreamy night with poetic seaman Peter ends with him returning to Russia. Forcing her to drop the titular line to Soviet leader Brezhnev.

What could have lapsed into schmaltz is given a caustic edge by Clarke, preserving the brassy wit of his screenplay.

And director Nicole Behan's zippy stage show has the sophistication of throwing-out-time on a Saturday night, making it a perfect match for the film.

The set is a mountain of bric-a-brac, while nostalgia is provided by Eighties tunes from The Smiths and The Human League.

Angela Simms is the life and soul of Merseyside as Teresa, while Ellie Clayton carries the plot's dilemma as girl-next-door Elaine – torn between her family, her mate and her heart.

As with all great love stories, the pair find the world set against them. Yet somehow the formula never feels formulaic.

Three Men In A Boat (Rose Theatre, Kingston, London until October 10): Three stars out of five   

Not all shaggy dog stories feature a shaggy dog. But one that does is Jerome K. Jerome's comic Victorian travelogue, Three Men In A Boat. 

In Al Smith's new version, freely adapted as a floating stag party, said mutt – Monty – is a puppet mongrel. He certainly advances the jollity of Jerome's genial caper, as three young chaps head up the Thames from Kingston to Oxford. But the zany comedy is overladen with gimmicks.

Christopher Haydon's hearty production is conceived as Victorian music hall: a wonky arch framing a small wooden skiff, sitting in front of a 19th-century river painting. And in a clever optical illusion, the stage appears to be listing.

There's plenty of innuendo ('never jeer at a fisherman who's missing his tackle'), and it climaxes in a battle with angry swans (jumped-up versions of Rod Hull's arm-bandit, Emu).

Grant Olding adds Edwardian parlour songs and a brilliant Gilbert and Sullivan spoof.

Richard David-Caine is a gangly maestro as George (going the whole hog with an extravagant sausage gag). Jonny Weldon plays stout, tricksy Jerome, and actress Bronte Barbe amuses as toothy, bespectacled third 'man' Morris, bracing for his nuptials.

Despite two-and-a-half hours of digressions, the story remains steadfastly buoyant.