Theatre: Falling apart at the seams

Even with some clever production techniques and good performances, Trousers just doesn't do it for Colin Murphy

Stop me if you've heard this before. Two mates, mid-to-late 30s, are forced to share a flat again after one of them is kicked out by the wife. Both have lots of bluster at the ready about how they're making something of their lives, but the little things give them away: one keeps asking the other if he has any beer, the other hasn't had a girlfriend, ever. Oh, and one has gone "out on his own" to do some "IT" work, while the other is a postman who'd rather be a DJ. Ah, it's not like back in New York, on the J1, when they were Michelob-drinking students.

Paul Meade and David Parnell's new play for Gúna Nua theatre company, Trousers, is strikingly unoriginal. There is nothing about their tale that couldn't be imagined by anybody who has ever been subjected to someone else's J1 stories at a party. Their observations on hitting their late-30s are similarly predictable. It's stuffed to the gills with odd-couple gags (the trousers of the title are the ones that the fat guy has to borrow from the thin guy...). And, in case you hadn't noticed that the play was about goodtime nostalgia, there's a soundtrack that might be a TV-only 'Time Of Our Lives' compilation ($29.95, exclusively on the Shopping Channel).

And good luck to them. The studio space at the Project Arts Centre was packed on Saturday night, almost entirely with women, oddly. The end of the play (a tiny, but cute, coup de teatre, that everybody saw coming but enjoyed none the less for it) was greeted by a raucous cheer. There are 150,000 people out there who have fast-fading memories of a J1 student-visa summer in the States, and the more faded those memories, the more likely they are to enjoy Paul Meade and David Parnell's generic version.

Yet Trousers is saved from being tediously predictable by no little charm in production. There are nice observational touches (such as the opening conversation on the intercom), some good, simple physical comedy (mostly surrounding Gerry McCann's midriff) and brief moments that have a genuine emotional power (largely due to an earnest integrity in Tom Murphy's performance). Lara Howe's set is cleverly conceived and beautifully realised, one moment an elegantly-furnished flat, the next a New York skyline, as the bookshelves are transformed into skyscrapers with some ingeniously simple lighting.

At 90 minutes without a break, the show is harder work than it needs to be: the concept is so elementary and the story so unelaborate that it could easily come in at closer to an hour. A tedious imperative on the part of the writers and director to milk it for every gag possible pulls it out. Less concern about the comedy would have let the characters breathe more, and let the audience out earlier, with maybe a little more to remember than just the laughs.

Trousers (or: Pants). Gúna Nua and Civic Theatre Project Arts Centre, 39 East Essex St, Dublin 2. 01 881 9613, www.project.ie Until 9 September

On to Civic Theatre, Tallaght, 11-16 September. www.civictheatre.ie

Draíocht Studio, Blanchardstown, 19-23 September. www.draiocht.ie

59E59 Theaters, New York, NY 5-22 October. (212) 753-5959