From the cheesy, arm-flinging opener 'Wide Open Spaces' there's an enjoyable knowingness about this whodunnit musical from 'Cabaret' and 'Chicago' creators John Kander and Fred Ebb, especially when squeezed into the tiny Landor.
Receiving its UK professional premiere courtesy of director Robert McWhir and a brilliantly game cast, it's a flawed but fun meshing of murder mystery and musical theatre cliché, lent additional charge by the troubled circumstances of its own genesis (both originator Peter Stone and lyricist Ebb died before it was finished).
When the leading lady of 'Robbin' Hood… of the Old West' is bumped off during opening night, the delighted cast and crew are all suspects. Quarantined in the theatre by an amdram-loving detective (Jeremy Legat), they have no choice but to work on reconfiguring their show around its lovesick lyricist (Georgia Hendricks).
It's good fun: Martin Thomas's sharp design slickly slides from glitz to graft, Robbie O'Reilly's playful choreography exploits every inch of space, and Bryan Kennedy pops one-liners as the acerbic director finger-clicking his team into a euphoric elegy ('she was a bitch and under pitch…').