Wink The Other Eye, Wilton's Music Hall, London

Though "music hall" is part of Wilton's name, this ghostly theatre, where the visitor feels he has stepped into a Sickert painting, has not played host to such entertainment in 120 years. The current show goes back to the past, but the irony and allusiveness of writer and director Angus Barr downplay the direct, emotional appeal of this popular art.

There's nothing wrong with the selection of songs, but the linking material is awkward and dull, at times tasteless and peculiar. In the middle of "Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay" a singer collapses and dies – from, we are told, a botched abortion. The other actors then stand around her corpse and sing "She Was Poor But She Was Honest". This contradicts the spirit of music hall, which was warm and big-hearted, inviting its poor patrons to laugh sympathetically at the misfortunes of others, such as the actor whose audience made him a present of Mornington Crescent: "They threw it, a brick at a time."

There's nothing wrong, either, with the men in the cast. With his irresistibly lugubrious face and plaintive George Formby imitation, David Morley Hale makes a comic masterpiece of the doleful "Standing at the Corner of the Street". Mark Pearce gives us a joyously expansive "I Live in Trafalgar Square", and Mike Sengelow's every syllable rings out loud and clear as Bow bells. But Suzie Chard is pushy and tough, and Kali Hughes's cold, offhand manner leaches all the gaiety from "Burlington Bertie". Neither is enjoying herself, it seems, and, as a result, nor do we.

'Wink the Other Eye' to 16 August (020-7702 2789)

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