THE last time any writer had such fun with chickens was Aardman Animation in Chicken Run in 2000.

And, yes, you read that correctly, chickens in Jack And The Beanstalk. Not only the golden egg-laying hen by the name of Daisy (don’t ask) in the possession of the Giant, but a farmyard of them.

All with names from the world of pop divas: Rihanna (Emily Alexander), Leona (Caitlin Thorburn), Gaga (Oliver Birch, yes a bloke playing a chick), and Beyoncé (Ross Devlin, another bloke, in red rooster tartan and a beard, but a hen nonetheless).

This is the latest in the wonderful series of Big Stories For Little People by York playwright Mike Kenny, who next year will be pre-occupied with rather bigger stories for big people: writing the 2012 York Mystery Plays.

Kenny’s greatest gift is not only an ability to tell a story but how he tells it, and for the first time Jack And The Beanstalk is told by chickens, in this case actor-musicians, and not one child in an audience of four-year-olds and upwards questions this decision.

From Mick Jagger’s Little Red Rooster cockerel strut to Portia, the sole hen in the Hutchinson garden, chickens are humorous to watch with their staccato head movements, their paddling motion as they scrat for food, and then there is their clucking, a strangely startled sound no matter the repetition of their life pattern. And they can’t walk backwards, although thev can move in circles, a quirk of nature taken on board by Gail McIntyre’s cast, especially in the chicken line dance scene.

All these mannerisms are captured from the outset by the company as they make their way from the foyer, through the audience, clucking and chuntering as they go, to Barney George’s farmyard barn stage design with jaunty musical director and composer Birch’s piano to one side.

And where is Jack and the beanstalk amid this hen party? Relax. Of course Kenny takes care of that too, even when letting his imagination run wild and as far as possible from pantomime’s straitjacket.

Jack (Nathan McMullen) is the layabout lad reluctant to do his farm chores and somewhat dim to boot, certainly not as clever or even as articulate as the chickens, who egg him, I mean urge him, on to face the the challenge of rescuing poor Pearl (Thorburn again) from the Giant. For all his sloth, he is likeable, especially in the hands of McMullen, whose face switches between insouciance and dumbfounded discovery.

Beanz meanz magic in Kenny’s world, and the beanstalk certainly has its moment in a beautiful transformation scene involving a boot, lighting and leafs that rightly draws a round of applause.

Come the second half, the story switches above the clouds to the Giant’s abode, where Emily Alexander has fun, almost in Terry Jones/Monty Python-style, as the stoical wife making human pie.

Stilts and shadow-play both play their part in creating the Giant, more visual delights in a show where language and image are both a joy in this fabulous Cluck And The Beanstalk.

Jack And The Beanstalk, Courtyard Theatre, West Yorkshire Playhouse, Leeds, until January 21 2012. Box office: 0113 213 7700 or wyp.org.uk