Communicado's Artistic Director Gerry Mulgrew takes to the stage to play Josef Gross the Managing Director baffled in and out of his position at the top of his company by bureaucracy and insinuation. Gerda Stevenson takes the role of director in this forty year old play written by playwright and Czech Republic politician Václav Havel. Stevenson brings an awesome cast together to play the schemers and dreamers of an organisation where workers spend their days talking nonsense, out to lunch or off at the shops.

In the drab grey mechanical world of a large company that deals in memos and nonsense speak, Deputy MD Jan Ballas takes a stab at a promotion by trying to lay an intricate trap for his superior. Ballas and his cohort Pillar establish a new language to be used within their company that Gross would have no hope in understanding. The results are often funny, sometimes confusing and always ridiculous, satirising the Communism of the then 1960's Czechoslovakia and, if Stevenson is to be believed, the ‘spin' of present day British politics. The highlight of this production is not the political message but the brilliant cast who seem just flawless with their characterisations.

This is theatre so absurd that is makes perfect sense. This is a great production with many brilliant moments and a strong cast that produce some truthful and exquisitely funny performances. Where the play fails is in its wordiness and length. The audience seem to lose their way in the dense long-windedness of the text. An edit of the play that cut the running time from two and a half hours down to two would improve it immensely. This is a fast paced, well directed, extremely funny show; it is just way too long.

On Tour throughout Scotland until Sunday 12 March.