Boris and Sergey's Vaudevillian Christmas Adventure (Theatre503)

With previous form at the Fringe, Flabbergast Theatre's vaudevillian leather puppets Boris and Sergey have been hyped, if not promoted in the run-up to this run at Theatre503.

This is a Christmas show, which causes much drama between the two puppets as one, the lover, fights for Christmas and the other, the grump, against.

But, due to its meandering nature, it can be quite difficult to watch. Although it is laugh-out-loud funny in places, it is also tiring and rather dull, thanks to the disorienting tendency to veer away from the plotlines at key moments, and, in the main, the overlong nature of many of the scenes (for instance, the Kate Bush impression is funny, but the song wears on, and on, and on and still the puppet dances).

There's no faulting the skill of the puppeteers, all of whom do an excellent job, and the piece works best during the audience participation elements, which add nothing to the story but allow the actors to have a bit of fun and improvise. On press night, the wonderful names of Ophelia (who was French, causing even more fun over the language barrier) and Thor made the cast's job easy.

It's as if Flabbergast have tried to cram too much in – it's half story, half sketch. They want to tell us about Boris and Sergey's origins, but they also want to show us the funny things they can make the puppets do (such as Matrix-style fights). It's impressive, but it's just not that interesting.