On the river no one can hear you scream.

As someone who survived several river boating holidays in the eighties when such adventures first burst onto the un-suspecting British countryside, I can vouch for the dangers to life, limb and sanity that lurk in the cabin and chemical loo.

The setting for Alan Ayckbourn’s comedy Way Upstream was all too familiar then as couples Keith and June, Alistair and Emma take the plunge and opt for a 12-day trip along the River Orb in their smaller than expected hired cruiser.

Daily Echo:

The cabins are cramped, the galley is challenging and the atmosphere is strained from the start as the friends and business partners attempt and fail to leave behind the cares of their industrial-strife-torn factory.

Someone naturally has to take command – naturally – but if over-bearing, work-obsessed Keith, played by a wonderfully pompous Peter Forbes, is a tin-pot Captain Bligh, he is to meet his Trafalgar in the form of muscle-bound new-comer Vince who soon has the crew dancing to his horn pipe.

Hampshire’s Sarah Parish is Keith’s long-suffering, glamorous wife June who takes to the arrival of wet and semi-naked Vince like a duck to water.

June’s inappropriate outfits become ever more revealing as knife-packing Vince begins to take charge of the vessel.

Played by Jason Durr, Vince is a riverside wanderer, or so he would have the holidaymakers believe, but as the river bank slips by and the good ship Hadforth Bounty sails ever closer to the aptly named Armageddon Bridge, a darker side to his generous nature comes to the fore.

Jason Hughes is wimpy, indecisive Alistair, who isn’t even certain he would be forced into action if wife Emma, played by Jill Halfpenny, was in real danger.

His secret dream to persuade her to go skinny-dipping somewhat sunk by the fact the non-swimmer never removes her lifejacket.

Emily Lang as rich sometime girl-friend to Vince and Nicola Sloane as the wonderfully harassed factory secretary Mrs Hatfield complete the marvellous human cast, all of whom are in constant danger of being overshadowed by the ingenious stage set, star of which has to be the boat herself set in a pool of ever murkier water.

Director Nadia Fall’s interpretation of Ayckbourn’s eighties classic is imaginative, with clever use of fast-action timing to speed the protagonists along their river adventure towards an inevitable watery climax.

There’s mud, there’s blood and plenty of expensive wine, which are never a good combination no matter who wears the captain’s hat.

Way Upstream cruises until May 16.