Not content with staging a hugely successful production of Roald Dahl’s story which has toured the country several times, Birmingham Stage Company has now gone back to basics with a new adaptation by David Wood.

Having seen the first version when it had its first run at the Old Rep in ??? I can’t say that I remember it as being all that different. But it certainly comes up brightly polished here, with Dahl’s typically over-the-top tale of a monstrous grandmother and her ingenious grandson given colourful and staging and performances.

When George’s demanding and ungrateful grandmother unexpectedly comes to stay on the family farm he finds himself waiting on her hand and foot, and somehow gets the idea that what she really needs is a boost to her regular medicine, achieved by adding every kind of household and farmyard substance that comes to hand.

The result is spectacular growth-spurt that not only has grannie’s neck bursting through the roof, but also some giant chickens running around the yard.

It’s Dahl at his most anarchic and poitically incorrect, and the children at the matinee performance I saw absolutely loved it.

It has a classic piece of theatrical magic when the grandmother grows through the roof before our very eyes, and it has the usual BSC virtues of direct, committed storytelling with no padding. Clark Devlin is an engaging George and Erika Poole makes a creditably obnoxious Grandma, but I did miss the extra level of grotesqueness in the original production, when Neal Foster played the role in drag.

Verdict: 4/5

Running time: One hour, 20 minutes. Until February 6.