KENNETH Horne's sudden death in 1969 brought an end to the iconic radio comedies Round The Horne and Beyond Our Ken.

Understandably the BBC wanted to continue mining that particular seam of humour, and the following year brought a new show based very much on the Horne template, with three of the Horne regulars, Hugh Paddick, the unflappable announcer Douglas Smith, and Kenneth Williams as the star.

It was not the success hoped for, but scripts have been dissected in the same way that the Horne originals were for recent stage shows. The format remains the same too, with the stage representing a BBC studio, and the performers reading the scripts at microphones, so if you wanted to you could actually shut your eyes and listen as if to a radio broadcast.

The show, a concoction of quips, sketches and crosstalk, is undoubtedly very funny, but less than perfect. A bigger audience would have helped. But maybe after the Horne compilations they're taking the bucket to this well once too often, with diminishing returns.

Or perhaps it's because Williams lacked the gravity of Horne around whom the most outrageous characters and actions revolved. Williams was a brilliant performer in his own right, but as essentially an eccentric he had little room to develop.

He was always best in small doses, in cameos like Rambling Sid Rumpo, or with Hugh Paddick as Julian and Sandy, and supporting other stars like Horne and Tony Hancock. It's a bit like cream tea without the scone.

But the evening, in affect little more than two staged radio broadcasts, provides a big quota of laughs, especially if you like smut, outrageous innuendo, blatant camp and send-ups.

And the cast are a joy. Robin Sebastian almost seems more Williams than Williams himself ever was, nostrils flaring, vocal chords strangulated and braying, audaciously delivering double entendres while contriving a look of wide eyes yet challenging naivety, and there are sterling contributions from Nigel Harrison (Hugh Paddick), India Fisher (Joan Sims), Charles Armstrong (Douglas Smith) and Timothy Dodd (Sound Effects).