THERE’S nothing better than theatre that makes willing captives of its audience and that’s what Prudhoe’s Really Youthful Theatre Company achieved with last week’s four-night revival of their home-grown black comedy musical Kind Hearts and Coronets, first performed by the company in 2009.

In fact, for one night only, members of the original cast returned to enjoy the bizarre experience of watching characters they’d given life to re-booted in a stylistically-different production.

Kind Hearts and Coronets tells the story of suave anti-hero Louis Mazzini, who avenges the rejection of his mother by her aristocratic D’Ascoyne family by murdering his way through the remaining members to become Duke of Chalfont.

And if that wasn’t enough to contend with, despite an illicit relationship with married childhood sweetheart, Sybella, he proposes to Edith D’Ascoyne, the widow of one of his victims.

The late Edwardian world was suggested by multi-media presentations opening both acts, and the whole production was cleverly set in a toy theatre with a 2D set gliding on and off as if on dowels and even the characters making their entrances in a slide.

This meant the production never lacked pace alongside a narrative and comedic chorus ensemble who played a whole range of minor parts, including school children, nosey tourists and murderous assistants, with aplomb.

There was never a dull or still moment from young actors Molly McClen, Charlotte Bell, Megan Curran, Molly Driver, Olivia Grevett, Emily Flood, Julia Maughan and Emma Richardson.

Company stalwart Amy Connolly popped up in many different guises, from prison warder to Tit Bits reporter, while newcomer Rebecca Stimpson suffered a fate worse than death as the willing paramour of Mazzini’s first victim before being dispatched herself and Alex Sabou proved herself in all sorts of roles in her debut.

Josh Lowes played his audience for maximum laughs, breathing life into three ultimately dead D’Ascoynes in homage to Sir Alec Guinness in the classic Ealing Comedy.

Josh also proved his worth as a musical theatre performer in three very different numbers prior to being stabbed, poisoned and blown up respectively.

Newcomer Adam Batey had a memorable debut as Admiral Lord Horatio D’Ascoyne, one of only two family members to die without a little help from their distant relative.

Grief stricken Lady Dorothea D’Ascoyne, gravely and austerely played by Eleanor Beck, sang movingly about the death of her only son then, in total ignorance, employed his murderer in her banking house, later dying of a stroke having named him as her heir.

Jay Orman was convincing as likeable young drunk Henry D’Ascoyne, winning our sympathy as much for being married to a prig as having his life cut short in his garden shed.

Molly McClen made suffragette and pro-feminist Lady Agatha D’Ascoyne suitably strident and the challenge of shooting her out of a hot air balloon on a school stage in Prudhoe was nicely handled by cartoon imagery and the killer line: “I shot an arrow in the air; she fell to earth in Berkeley Square.”

After performing in six school shows, Thomas Hill leaves the company this year on a witty jazz song and dance number extolling the virtues of being a member of the aristocracy, shortly before being caught in a man trap then shot.

The irony of the story is, of course, that Mazzini isn’t arrested for the murders he did commit, but for the murder of Lionel Holland, his girlfriend’s husband.

Shay Young was endearing as the unloved but wealthy Lionel, who spends all his money on his young wife then kills himself so the “little woman” will be kept in the manner she’s become accustomed to by the insurance money.

Bronwen Davies-Jones was incredible as Sybella.

The audience enjoyed not only her performances as a singer, but the contribution she made to the harmony of the whole production, assisted by Jay Orman.

Priggish Edith D’Ascoyne, the other player in the love triangle, was a comedic masterpiece by Ruby Shrimpton, given that the character never smiles, proving once more that a theatrical career beckons.

And then, of course, there’s Louis Mazzini himself, Simon Weatherspoon, holding the whole show together in his first ever venture into musical theatre.

In a performance that hardly allowed him to leave the stage, he was charming, cold and ruthless and the audience so wanted him to get away with it – what a find and what a voice; no wonder the cast recordings sold out.

With slick production values, excellent set design and management by Malcolm York and his scene stealers, beautiful period costumes by June Boyd, witty words and memorable music and the technical expertise of Jake Stokoe on lights, this is a show the company were right to revive.

Tradition has it that on the final night of the run, a song reveals next year’s show, so look out for Romeo & Juliet by the musical theatre conspirators Rushmere & Boyd, because the audience loved the taster This is Love, sung by next year’s leads Bronwen Davies-Jones and Shay Young.