BLONDES have more fun. So much so that Hull playwright Alan Plater has returned to the fertile soil of his television drama The Last Of The Blonde Bombshells - the one where Dame Judi Dench swore on hearing that ghastly song Magic Moments at a funeral.

The "Last" chapter featured the reunion concert of a wartime all-girl swing band. Now Plater presents their original union, the "first" of the Blonde Bombshells, in a humorous and sentimental musical play of bombshells and bomb shells, decorated by the music of Fats Waller, Glenn Miller and Flanagan and Allen.

Once more Dench's character, Elizabeth, is the central figure, and this time there are two of her. The Elizabeth of today (Dilys Laye) is the narrator, in reflective mood on the first anniversary of the death of her husband. The radio is playing Memories Of You, a lonesome song she has not heard for 50 years, taking her back to her memories of her younger, nave schoolgirl self (Karen Paullada's Liz).

At a click of Elizabeth's finger, Plater transports us back to northern 1943, when bottle-blonde band leader Betty (Elizabeth Marsh) and her equally cynical, worldly band members Vera (Sarah Groarke), May (Ruth Alexander) and Grace (Barbara Hockaday) are needing new recruits for "the most glamorous band in the land".

Step forward schoolgirl Liz; a singing nun, Lily (Claire Storey), who tiptoes her way through George Formby's innuendo booby-trapped In Me Little Snapshot Album in complete innocence; and a cut-glass socialite from the army, Miranda (Victoria Moseley), whose foot is in her mouth more often than her saxophone is.

The nun, the schoolgirl and the glamorous soldier may be the stuff of a pub joke but now they are to be turned into the Valentino Sisters, the West Riding's answer to the Andrews Sisters, trilling their way through Don't Sit Under The Appletree.

All that leaves is the need for a drummer. Enter the crooning, pinstripe-clad Pat. Pat is Patrick, seeking a cover to continue dodging the draft and, like Lemmon and Curtis before him in Some Like It Hot, Ralph Gassmann slips divinely into a dress.

The sight of Pat sets Elizabeth's heart pitter-pattering as she recalls her teenage crush, a relationship renewed by the re-appearance of Patrick (John Woodvine's smooth charmer) at the funeral. That story and the Blonde Bombshells's radio concert drives the second half of this gentle tale of nostalgia and wartime female empowerment.

The period detail, the salmon-pink dresses and blonde hair are a joy in Roxana Silbert's delightful production, the joy doubled by the playing and singing skills of the actor-musicians. Laye's performance, all old-school glamour and warmth, is the icing on the cake.

Box office: 0113 213 7700

Updated: 13:05 Friday, April 30, 2004