It's good for the soul, I think, when expectations of a play are turned on their head.

I confess I was feeling a little forlorn as the excellent Rachel Henery pressed bravely on through the apparently interminable prologue to House of Desires, the 17-Century farce presented at the Crescent Theatre by Birmingham School of Acting.

I had never seen it before, and at that point I had no reason to suspect that it was a farce. At that point, Brian Rix would surely have passed by on the other side of the street. And anyway, it was written by a Mexican nun.

Fortunately, after Rachel had done her duty and given us what at the time seemed to be the entire plot, she and the other members of the company in Paul Milton's production were able to cut loose with the funny stuff.

They did it splendidly - though what the late Sister Juana In>s de la Cruz would have made of some of the freewheeling interpolations like "you're a miserable git" is anybody's guess.

Tonight, the BSA moves on to the second pair of productions in its season, also at the Crescent, with Love Lies A-Bleeding and The Misanthrope, which will continue in tandem until Saturday.