BOOKING NOW: MUST SEE EVENT

The 39 Steps Lyceum Theatre, Sheffield, April 30-May 4. Tickets 0114 249 6000, sheffieldtheatres.co.uk

THE smash-hit Olivier and Tony Award-winning comedy stage adaptation of, Alfred Hitchcock’s classic spy thriller The 39 Steps is back out on a UK tour after nearly ten years in London’s West End and taking Broadway by storm and heads to Sheffield’s Lyceum Theatre later this month.

After playing in 39 countries across the globe, the show has delighted over three million people worldwide with its plucky spirit and dashing sense of fun. The production follows the adventures of handsome hero Richard Hannay – complete with stiff-upper-lip, British gung-ho and pencil moustache – as he encounters dastardly murders, double-crossing secret agents, and, of course, devastatingly beautiful women. This inventive and gripping comedy thriller features four fearless actors, playing 139 roles in 100 minutes of fast-paced fun and thrilling action.

John Buchan wrote the book in 1915 and Alfred Hitchcock turned it into a classic spy film in the 1930s, but Edward Snape, producer of the stage version, feels the story still resonates today. “It's set in 1935, so there's a sense that the world is potentially at war with itself,” he says. “Sadly things haven't really changed since then in terms of one great superpower facing off against another great superpower, with spies in the mix.

“These themes are in the John Buchan novel and the Hitchcock film, and it still feels relevant now. But the best thing of all is that this version is a comedy and I think people want that more than ever now. They want to laugh. It's a story with suspense and drama but also absurd, wonderful comedy.”

Patrick Barlow, who wrote the stage adaptation, feels theatregoers will also relate to the hero Hannay, saying: "He has a realisation of what a dangerous world we're in and that we have to be really careful of people bullying us, totalitarian states and so on. That might make it sound deadly serious but I hope it's also riotously funny. It’s madcap and very fast-moving but with heart.”

Critics certainly think it’s all of those things and more. They have been singing the show’s praises ever since it premiered at the West Yorkshire Playhouse in 2005 right through to its nine-year West End run at the Criterion Theatre.