Theatre - Squabbling siblings outwit the authorities in a modern farce, writes Michael Portillo Tom, Dick and Harry Duke of York's Theatre, London WC2

Officialdom dictates our lives. It is a nervous time for a married couple such as the Kerwoods when the lady from the authorities visits to determine whether they are fit to adopt a baby. The south London couple have learned by rote the manual on how to maintain a safe environment for a child in their nicely kept Kennington home ("Saucepan handles must be turned inward"). Tom, in his shirt and tie, and Linda, in her neat white blouse and black skirt, look thoroughly middle class, and ought to be shoo-ins (although, in this politically correct age, perhaps they would in reality be no-hopers). Alas, they have not counted on the intervention of Tom's younger brothers, Dick and Harry, two charming but not-too-bright wide boys who wheel and deal on the outer fringes of the law.

Dick has a self-contained flat upstairs and Harry, though assistant porter at a hospital, often dosses down at Tom's, much to Linda's irritation. The Kerwoods would definitely have done well to schedule their appointment with the inspectorate for a time when both brothers were a thousand miles away. As it is, with the minutes ticking away towards 10am, when the formidable Mrs Potter is due, the siblings unleash mayhem on the household. It reaches its climax, of course, as she steps through the door.

Ray Cooney (author of many farces including Run For Your Wife) has joined with his son Michael to write this extremely funny romp. Ray comments that at the centre of his plays is the love-able rogue. "The audience has got to like these people," he says. This time there are three attractive rascals; for, while Tom has a veneer of respectability, once the going gets tough, he lies more fluently than his brothers, earning their gasps of admiration.

The audience does like them: the production has recruited three (of the four) McGann brothers, and charm is definitely their long suit. It makes a difference that the trio on stage are brothers in reality. Could any other three actors produce the same intimacy and easy flow?

Joe McGann as Tom is larger than, and not especially like, his brothers. Tom's tragedy is at the heart of the farce. Within the space of an hour and a half, his aspirations and his marriage are blown apart by the catastrophes visited upon him by Dick and Harry. Blood rushes frequently to Joe's face. Here is an actor feeling Fortune's every hammer blow, his purple face eloquently expressing exasperation with his two well-meaning siblings as their naivety brings destruction in its wake.

Stephen McGann is well cast as Dick, a good-looking likely lad who comes closest to getting the girl. She is a pretty asylum-seeker who has turned up stowed away in the van that he borrowed from Tom to bootleg cigarettes from Calais. Stephen chats her up in sign language, which (carried to extremes) is in itself a virtuoso performance. Like Joe, he hurls himself into the part, the arteries in his neck apparently near to bursting as the tension mounts. But at other times Dick is the amused spectator, popping out from his flat like a jovial Greek chorus to comment on the mess engulfing Tom's life.

Harry is the idiot brother. The problems introduced by Dick seem easy to resolve compared to Harry's decision to bring home, just before Mrs Potter's arrival, fragments of a cadaver pinched from the hospital. Still, Harry is as good as his brothers at spinning yarns and not bad at keeping track of the latest whoppers invented by them. Mark McGann plays him wide-mouthed and high-pitched. He must be the acrobat in the family, because time and again he is hurled out of the window or dives through it.

Inevitably, other actors are overshadowed by the tight-knit trio. Mark Wingett, DC Carver in television's The Bill, does well as Constable Downs, the fortunately half-witted bobby who happens by while the mayhem is being unleashed. Hannah Waterman (Laura Beale in EastEnders) has the unenviable task of playing Tom's boot-faced wife. Brian Greene and Sarah Wateridge have the daft roles of the asylum-seekers, rushing around hysterically and supposedly talking to us in Albanian.

Louise Jameson is Mrs Potter, a cardboard cut-out authority figure. It surprises me a bit that, in a farce that has carefully chosen 21st-century themes (the National Health Service, people-trafficking, cross-Channel smuggling), Mrs Potter seems to be plucked from the 1950s. I doubt that nowadays those entrusted with deciding the suitability of parents sound like Hattie Jacques (least of all in Kennington).

Ray Cooney himself directs. The set has five doors and a window, and, as you would expect, they burst open and bang shut with heart-stopping precision as the brothers try to hide body parts, cigarettes and extraneous refugees from Linda, Mrs Potter and PC Downs. Oh, and from the Russian mafia, too. It's a great hoot, and very well done.

Booking on 0870 060 6623 until 7 January 2006

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