A LITTLE corner of Tuscany enlivened a wet and windy Malvern but holiday spirit disappeared in a lively and fascinating foray into the darker recesses of the Christian faith and Roman Catholic Church.

A full house was testament to the combination of a new play by Hugh Whitemore and a strong cast headed by Derek Jacobi at the Malvern Theatres.

Mr Whitemore took a somewhat unlikely plot and came out with a thought-provoking and stimulating debate on the nature of faith and vulnerability of belief systems.

The play opened with four friends enjoying an evening in a remote Tuscan villa. A car crash in the woods brings a stranger (Jacobi) into the mix and he unfolds a tale of conspiracy and murder which has led him to flee for his life.

Jacobi provided the pace, at once both aggressive and charmingly scatty, nudging the audience over the more unlikely aspects of the plot and remaining focused on the stimulating subject matter.

The play has been described as controversial and certainly Jacobi's character, Humphrey Biddulph, spares no efforts in kicking lumps off the origins of Christianity.

That said, I could not see anything offensive in it, wholehearted atheists are not necessarily backwards in coming forwards and it is not the first time the Roman Catholic Church has been used for target practice.

But where Biddulph failed to make headway against his far less informed hosts was in confounding the nature of faith and its positive effect on human existence.

He could not see it, it could not be proved and that ultimately seemed his problem, not his hosts, who were able to turn to faith in their time of need.

By the end he seemed a classic conspiracy theorist, of the sort familiar to journalists everywhere, with all the answers and all the reasons but ultimately not completely convincing.

The pace was good, the cast was excellent, there were some very good laughs and the whole thing proved deep rather than heavy, a fine example of serious subject made accessible by drama.

David Edwards