U

NCLE Vanya is so boring there's a scene in which the man of the title trains a gun on the brother he thinks has done the dirty on him and I hoped I would be caught in the crossfire.

Then I remembered the weapon being brandished by the majestic Tom Courtenay only fired blanks and there was no chance of me being put out of my misery.

Imagine, if you can, that tortoises were big enough to carry human beings and you booked one to take you to London.

This will give you some idea just how slow Anton Chekhov's play really is. This comes from somebody who loved The Three Sisters and The Cherry Orchard.

Uncle Vanya is a play about simmering passion and betrayal, but in the words of a friend of mine, "a lot of over reacting goes on".

In the second half Astrov and Yelena - she's married to an academic with one foot in the grave - finally show their true feelings for each other.

But this explosion of passion seems rather incongruous. You knew where you were when everyone was walking about, wearing facial expressions that could curdle milk.

There are lighter moments in the piece but the humorous interludes are short lived and they fail to dispel the sense of gloom which hangs around the Royal Exchange like a dense, impenetrable fog.

Performances, as you would expect from this theatre, are flawless. Courtenay treats us to yet another acting master class as Vanya, while Robert Glenister and Helen Schlesinger impress as Astrov and Yelena.

How do you follow a play like that? With a party, of course. The occasion was the theatre's 25th birthday.

Before the revels began artistic director Braham Murray remembered the great names who had played the world famous venue.

All these leading luvvies were conspicuous by their absence at the post performance bash. Pity that - I was looking forward to sharing a bread stick with Robert Lindsay.

Rick Bowen

l Until October 20.