AN award-winning theatre company will be returning to the stage in May performing a hit West End farce.

Kingsley Players are set to stage There Goes the Bride, by the dynamic duo of comedy theatre, Ray Cooney and John Chapman.

Described by one national newspaper critic as ‘a fiendishly clever farce which gets madder and funnier as it goes along’, the play revolves around the nightmare scenario of a harassed advertising executive who hits his head on the morning of his daughter’s society wedding.

He wakes to find himself in the company of Polly Perkins, a 1920s flapper girl, straight out of his current advertising campaign, and it soon becomes apparent that no one else can see or hear her.

Kingsley Players first performed this master comedy in 1983 when the current director, Malcolm Barker, was in the cast.

Now, 41 years later, it marks his 120th play and his 34th in the director role.

Malcolm said: “I am delighted to be working with a fantastic cast on this revival.

“Set on the morning before a wedding at the bride’s home, it is just as riotous and hilarious as when it was first written.

“When I revisited the script, I decided that although it retained its character as a classic mid-century piece, it would still resonate with a modern audience.

“The cast agree, and we hope audiences will enjoy it too.”

Malcolm is working with eight hugely talented and experienced actors, including Simon Hetherington, Jen Deakin, and Lisa Buckley, who recently shone in One Man Two Guvnors.

They will be joined by Lesley Silcock, Neil Silcock, and Murray Milligan, stars of this January’s panto, Mother Goose, as well as Ian Lancaster from Allo Allo, and Valarie Ball, who took the lead female role in the group’s 2022 production of Cooney’s play, Funny Money.

There Goes the Bride will be on stage at Kingsley Theatre in Kingsley Community Centre, WA6 8ED, from Wednesday, May 15, to Saturday, May 18, at 7.30pm.

Tickets cost £11, with £7 tickets available for students/children. These can be booked online at www.kingsleyplayers.co.uk or by ringing the box office on 07724 892 154.