Red-wheeled carriages with heavy hoods stand ready to transport the card-playing conmen of Gogol's "Gamblers", at the Tricycle theatre. Newly translated by Scots playwright Chris Hannan, the play is a slight, repetitive tale of three swindlers linking up with a fourth to relieve a young hussar of his fortune.
The designer is the highflying Russian Oleg Sheintsis, working with Dalia Ibelhauptaite, a young Lithuanian director. She creates an atmosphere of cheats' camaraderie but no sense of pace. The only effort to involve the audience comes from the expressively gorgeous Russian actor, Oleg Menshikov, whose looks borrow something of Nigel Havers and something of Mikhail Baryshnikov (Menshikov was seen in London last year with Vanessa Redgrave in Martin Sherman's "When She Danced"). There is an entertaining cameo from Anthony Milner as a corrupt finance official, but the general effect is of a cumbersome trifle.

Submitted by Jane Grey