THESPIAN four-piece The HandleBards tour their productions with a twist: they rely on pedal power to get them to each venue, set, costumes and all.

This comes as part of a green initiative to reduce their carbon footprint while delivering quality Shakespearean drama to audiences around the country.

Playing Hamlet, one of Shakespeare’s best-known tragedies, as a comedy is always going to be a difficult task. But the scene was set immediately, with Hamlet making his stage entrance in the Merchant Adventurers' Hall with a black cartoon cloud hanging over his head, and his mother, Gertrude, as gleefully drunk as an elderly relative at a wedding.

This wasn’t a production for Shakespeare purists, but was consistently hilarious, inviting the audience to poke fun at the sometimes stuffy performances of such esteemed plays.

The set was resourceful and inventive, with set changes and curtains powered by pedalling one of the two bikes that flanked the edge of the stage, creating visual interest for the audience as well serving a necessary purpose. Equally, both props and costumes were used to great comic effect: most prominently in the duel scene, where Hamlet and Laertes battled to the death - with ladles.

Shakespeare would probably be turning in his grave, but  who says that’s a bad thing? The HandleBards’ production brought catharsis, but in a different form than the Bard may have intended: the audience were crying, but with laughter, not despair. It’s not often that a production is both crackers and cracking, but the HandleBards have a foot set firmly in each camp.