STAGE REVIEW: Dead Sheep - at the Festival Theatre, Malvern, from Monday, November 14 to Saturday, November 19, 2016.

THIS is a cracking little play!

While it may be little in length - lasting just two hours including an interval, there is no way little does it full justice as it packs in plenty and has a powerful punch or two dealing as it does with a political event of seismic proportions a quarter of a century ago.

Johnathan Maitland’s excellent script is splendidly pulled together by director Ian Talbot to neatly encapsulate the events that led to the collapse of Maggie Thatcher’s reign as Prime Minister.

In short, and in true Brutus style, she was stabbed in the back by one of her closest confidantes and friends of the time, Geoffrey Howe - who was once described by the irascible Labour MP Denis Healey, he of the bushy eyebrows, that being attacked by Howe was like being savaged by ‘a dead sheep’.

How Thatcher Towers came tumbling down and all the shenanigans unfolded is conjured up with considerable zip and wit by Maitland’s amusing, hilarious at times, take on the turmoil which had been bubbling just under the Thatcher Government in its final days.

It suggests Howe was the worm that turned but at the same time offers the feeling he was also a brave one in making what many analysts believe to be one of the most brilliant political speeches ever.

If ever revenge was best served cold this was it…

Maitland takes us behind the scenes of this intriguing story and looks at the frosty relationship between Mrs T and Mrs H, Howe’s indomitable wife Elspeth. What role did this Left-leaning housewife play or was it simply that Howe had more guts and integrity then many originally game him credit for? After all Maggie had sacked her Foreign Secretary!

This is as much Howe’s story as Mrs T’s and it’s all the better for it.

Some of the waspish humour fairly crackles and there are plenty of reminders alluding to that excellent satirical show, Spitting Images with a well-versed cast completely up for and equal to the challenge.

Steve Nallion, one of the founding visionaries of SI captures many of the Iron Lady’s traits, right down to the minutest detail and Christoper Villiers’ artistic creativity overflows with the likes of Alan Clark and Bernard Ingham, along with his impression of the Welsh windbag, Neil Kinnock, and others which are bang on target.

Elsewhere there are other caricatures of considerable pedigree with John Wark’s Brian Walden, Graham Seed’s Ian Gow and Nigel Lawson, and the outstanding pairing of Paul Bradley and Carol Royle as the Howes.

Along with the comedy there is tragedy, and a heady brew of loyalty, betrayal and revenge. And of course the two main protagonists provide us with that rarity - two politicians who believed they were acting in the nation’s best interests. Misguided, stubborn or what? But how many in power today could claim that?

There’s nothing really new for anyone acquainted with politics in the 1970s and 80s but it’s quite a timely reminder given all that has been occurring in recent times with the Brexit vote and that incredible election result across the Atlantic.

Just proves - you can never expect the unexpected?