A COUPLE of nights in York came and went, but finally the Stones' show rolls into Harrogate for a proper, overdue five-night run. In the words of John Mills contemplating a long-desired beer in Ice Cold In Alex, it was "well worth waiting for".

Marie Jones's comedy with a tragedy forewarned in its title is set in a small County Kerry village, where Hollywood's film makers have oft dipped their finger in this south-west Irish honey pot. They return once more to make The Quiet Valley with leading lady Caroline Giovanni on a six million contract. By comparison, the locals are on £40 a day as extras. Among them are villager Jake Quinn (Christopher Patrick Nolan), returned from his dispiriting fortune-seeking sojourn to New York, and the outwardly happy Charlie Conlon (Martin Jenkins), whose video shop in Ballycastle, Northern Ireland went belly up, prompting him to try his hand at script writing.

Against a backdrop of clouds fringed with film reel and a row of shoes that signifies the status of the extras, the well-matched Nolan and Jenkins play 14 characters between them, as Hollywood myth, glamour and ego rub up against Irish hope and reality.

With only a box of clothes to assist them, they mine broad humour from their quick-fit leaps from Jake and Charlie to the likes of fluttering young production assistant Aisling, canny and crumpled veteran extra Old Mickey, hammy director Clem Curtis and calculating diva Giovanni, but sadness rises dark as Guinness.

The sting lies in southern Ireland's feeling of being used and taken for a ride; their cows aren't Irish enough for Hollywood, and young druggie Sean's rejection leads to desperate measures in a tale of them and us for you and me.

Box office: 01423 502116

Updated: 09:00 Thursday, June 23, 2005