Glorious stuff, the world of Shakespearian send-up and Sarah Giles' production of a classic Australian take on Shakespeare's "rude mechanicals" makes the most of it.

Make no mistake about it; these are not just Athenian tradies wanting to have their play chosen for Duke Theseus' wedding celebrations at the end of A Midsummer Night's Dream. They may have day jobs but they also have a repertoire that includes the extremely vulgar Beryl the Widow and considerable skills with what might be termed Theatre of the Rubber Chicken.

Their world is Shakespeare's but it inexplicably also contains irons and ironing boards and cardboard cask wine. Tailor Robin Starveling (Julie Forsyth) cheerfully runs her business via a series of elderly telephones and the musically inventive Snug (Holly Austin) tangles with a drum kit downstage. The cask wine fuels Ralph Mowldie, the run-down but professional actor fleetingly recruited when Bottom (both played by Charles Mayer) disappears with an ass' head on his shoulders.

Snout (Lori Bell) has a valiant go at stand-up and Flute (Nathan O'Keefe) floats around in white tights, only briefly resisting the role of Thisbe on the grounds that he has "a beard coming". Mayer's Bottom is a seriously pedantic bloke with more than a touch of John Cleese and a lower-class Malvolio.

They are held together by the serious Peter Quince (Rory Walker), who finds a lovely use for Henry V's "Once more unto the breach…" as he dresses for Pyramus and Thisbe.

The set contains a heap of trapdoors, while round the edges are the grottier trappings of backstage. The elements of this are given a highly imaginative workout with lots of special effects at the right moments. The Mechanicals may be technically amateurs whose request to do an encore will be firmly rejected by Theseus but they certainly know how to throw a stage around.

And the core of all of this, the seminal Pyramus and Thisbe, gets a gorgeous going over as they take to a "drama workshop brought up to concert pitch" style that involves white body suits. There's stage fright and throwing up and things go wrong with a vengeance where the chink in the wall through which the lovers are to speak is concerned. It's a world where Starveling's huge reflective moon half blinds the audience but not enough to miss Forsyth's deeply expressive face.

The original 1987 script has had a few nips and tucks and necessary updates and runs very well indeed without an interval.

Brush up your Pyramus and Thisbe and get along to the Playhouse for what is a far too brief season.