Almost two years to the day after it was first announced, Zadie Smith’s adaptation of Chaucer arrives at the Kiln Theatre in Kilburn. So much has happened in that time that we are lucky to have it at all. Respect to everyone involved in bringing this powerful piece to life.

This production shouts, Theatre is Back! And we roar our approval for that but also because The Wife of Willesden, is a brilliant piece of staging. Ten actors take 25 parts (or perhaps 46, according to the Programme notes) in a set reproducing the Sir Colin Campbell pub complete with tables, punters and more spirit bottles than you can shake a stick at – if that’s your idea of fun.

Like Emma Rice’s legendary 2018 adaptation of Angela Carter’s Wise Children this play is a celebration of theatre itself with the mood dial set at Wild Good Time and the speed at Catch Us If You Can. The Company, Director and Movement Directors show just what they can do in a confined space. Presumably with a team of unsung heroes is hard at work backstage, handling props and costumes. Though a sparkle jacket is enough to turn one husband into an evangelical minister, a tin tray turns another into a saint, and a simple turban conjures up the Author herself, who is dragged away as she tries to apologise for her career. It’s almost a relief to find they’re human after all when a lock of hair gets caught in a veil and lands on the stage. Unless that was deliberate….

With Clare Perkins’s Alvita anchoring the piece with an unstoppable torrent of words – until Queen Nanny gives her the evil eye –  and razor-sharp support from the cast,  Alvita’s Husbands groan and flinch as she exposes their shortcomings (word used here in a technical sense) and twerk at her command.  The Wife of Willesden drives on with tremendous verve, invention and dirty laughs, only slackening as we shift gear into the Tale. “Don’t worry,” we’re told. “There’s not much more. You’ll still get home in time.”

Except… Is it too entertaining? Stretches of adapted Chaucer rush past with cameo flourishes, punctuated by disco numbers, mime and simulated sex, that tend to distract from the text. When darker notes arrive late in the play – a rape, domestic violence – they are almost submerged by the hour-long up-beat crescendo that precedes and struggle to engage. The spectacle and high adrenalin levels don’t allow reflection. Which is fine for a panto, but it does divert attention from issues with the original text.