Penny Dreadfuls Present... The Never Man

The Penny Dreadfuls stormed last year's Fringe. A tightly wrought, Victorian-themed murder mystery cum comedy caper, their daft, jokes-a-minute script was a lesson in narrative comedy. But this year's show isn't such a tight act.

One of the joys of the Dreadfuls of yore was the excitement that, every so often, one of the trio would unleash an ad libbed gem – a bonus of their origins in improvised comedy. They do that here. They do it a lot. Far too often, in fact, which is a shame because the troupe's frequent digressions, in-jokes and corpsing look oddly like the tools of a student group, not those of the polished pros the trio can be. One can't help but feel there's an attempt here to smooth over the gaps in a somewhat weak script.

That's not to say this isn't an enjoyable evening. The decision to opt for a beef-based theme gives rise to some deliciously silly language fun: "beef island"; "beefy"; "beef-leader"; "beefiest time ever". And it's clear that the troupe haven't lost their knack of picking apart the silliness of certain generic expectations: "we meet again," growls one evil henchman. "Yes, we meet most days," notes another.

There are some wonderfully weighted characterisations: Paul, an eight-year-old tyke played by all six-and-a-half odd feet of Humphrey Ker is admirably surreal, providing some delightful mismatches between character and actor as the words of a man leak from the mouth of a boy. Played by a man. But when he embarks upon yet more rambling improvs with the other characters, the effect is diluted, if not completely lost.