Billed as an adults only Christmas show, I was expecting an X-rated, smutty comedy to pan out in front of me at The Old Fire Station.

Instead a brilliant, Oxford based and written social snapshot unfolded reminding us that while we are settling down to a turkey feast, we should spare a thought for those for whom Christmas is less exciting.

If that sounds heavy-handed, it’s not. We meet Jo the cleaner (played by comedian Joanna Neary) who comes across Omar (comic Omar Ibrahim), an Oxford University student who has been locked in a trunk at a student party. While she cleans up the debris, he treats her with the disdain and arrogance that only one with such a promising future and lack of life experience can do.

She in turn directs all her naive and bigoted “I’m not rascist but.....” aspersions on him about muslims and immigrants to a soul-destroying-Daily Mail reading degree that the audience visibly grimaces.

We cry, laugh, and sing. There is karaoke aplenty, (sign up for your interval slot), an on-set bar, a litter picking exercise, and some hard-hitting truths and revelations about society, humanity, friendship, luck and fate.

Because, of course, Jo and Omar, are not what they seem, and that old mantra about appearances being deceptive and never judging a book by its cover, rips up all our pre-conceptions and makes us reconsider our stand, along with the characters themselves.

Stark and basic maybe, but this two-man play had me thinking long and hard after it closed in a whirl of glitter and empty beer cans.

But hurry, because this alternative to the Christmas show closes on Saturday.

Katherine MacAlister 5/5

oldfirestation.org.uk

01865 263990