FRESH from a run in Manchester, Paul Osborne’s sweetly sad and funny three-hander arrives in the writer’s home city in this tight and involving production.

In a play that lasts barely an hour, no word or scene is wasted. The simple scenario summons humanity, hope and loss.

A meeting takes place on a bench in the shadow of the Minster, as student Felix (Tom Gladstone) finds his quiet lunch interrupted by the arrival of the loud, Barnsley brash and – apparently – sexually giving Raquel (Hannah Dee), who has broken off from a hen party, wearing fairy wings and a sexy traffic warden’s outfit.

Their characters are set: he is bookish, reserved and standoffish; she is forward, up for it and full of teasing life. Initial hostility on his part turns to hesitant curiosity, then they part as tantalising loose ends.

In leaving, Raquel offers advice to Felix about his dying father. Look me up, she says, you won’t be sorry, not meaning it, but he does, trailing her to her flat in a tower-block, where a different sort of truth emerges.

The bluest blue refers to the sky, Felix’s eyes, the lapis lazuli of Renaissance art, and, more tangentially, the distance between people, including the odd couple at the heart of Osborne’s affecting drama.

Alan Booty completes the cast as wise street-cleaner Stevie in this well acted and moving piece, nimbly directed by Paul Stonehouse. If only all plays were this short and this good.

The Bluest Blue, Old Bomb Theatre Company, 41 Monkgate, August 6 at 8pm and August 7, at 6pm and 8pm. Box office: 01904 623568