Folio Theatre is a relatively new company and Unearthed is their first production. We favourably reviewed their second show, Reel Life, at the Ustinov in Bath on these pages last month. Apart from that, I knew little about them, but as I read through the programme, waiting for the house lights to dim, I couldn’t help raising my eyebrows at the company’s credentials . . . There is much to admire and great potential here.

Stones in His Pockets has been around for twenty years now (exactly the same as Riverdance) and, from its humble beginnings in rural Ireland, has played the West End and Broadway and generally taken over the world even though, to a certain extent, it still hides its light under a bushel . . . A little gem of a play very nicely done. Recommended.

The ukulele has become really popular, almost nerdily so, in the past few years with clubs, conventions, festivals and orchestras. Everybody seems to have one, I suppose because they are small, cheap and perceived as easy to play. Big mistake, as Steven Sproat’s playing demonstrated . . . I think it is here that Steven’s real strength lies, with an instrument on which he truly is a virtuoso.

If one was being charitable, one would call Frederick Knott’s Dial M for Murder whodunit a classic. If one was being less than charitable one would call it a potboiler. The play has been around since 1952 and was standard fodder – sorry, fare – for rep theatres over the following three decades, as well as being made into a famous film by master of the genre, Alfred Hitchcock. It compares well to the majority of Agatha Christie plays, having a strong and complex plot line and only five characters on whom to concentrate.