ON The Stray, the Netherlands National Circus was in town. At Harrogate Theatre, there was a rival attraction: the Denmark State Circus, but this was no ordinary circus show.

Any similarity with the characters and plot of Hamlet was entirely intentional, because director Rob Swain and his leading lady, Shelly Willetts, have picked up Bob Carlton's mantle of turning Shakespeare's plays into rock'n'roll musical spoofs.

Buoyed by Harrogate audiences lapping up Carlton's From A Jack To A King (Macbeth in a rock band) and Return To The Forbidden Planet (The Tempest in space), they have laced the tragedy of Hamlet with B-movie clichs and rock songs.

Claudius has become Claude the Ringmaster (Edward York); Gertrude is now fortune teller Gertie (Shelly Willetts); and Ophelia is trapeze artist Layla (Nicola Bolton; cue the inevitable "Trapeze or not trapeze?" gag). Hamlet, the crown prince, is transformed into Gordon (Matthew Bowyer), the prince of clowns, all sadness behind the loon front.

Swain's familiar repertory cast is well versed in the art of these Shakespeare spoofs, the actor-musicians picking up where they left off in 'Planet', albeit with circus skills newly added to their repertoire, courtesy of juggling and unicycling training with Goronwy Thom.

On Paul Colley's Big Top set design, the show's music - superb throughout - hits the ground running with Claude's wedding-day rendition of Celebration. However, the dialogue takes a little while to settle into its rhythm of authentic Hamlet text and mischief making in the manner of the Reduced Shakespeare Company, with digs at luvvie actors, the city of Leeds and movie product placement (look out for the Lucozade dispenser).

Highlights include the rock opera of Meat Loaf's Bat Out Of Hell, here sung by Gordon's ghostly, leather-clad father (Phil Corbitt, with Darth Vader's wheezing voice); Gordon's To Be Or Not To Be, conducted to a hall of mirrors as he sings Tears Of A Clown; the guitar solo dual of Bowyer and Jon Bonner's Larry; the B-movie heroism and singing of Howard Gay's Horace, the lion tamer; and Beverley Edmunds's choreography for the Thriller finale.

This hit musical is Harrogate Theatre's answer to Baz Luhrmann's Moulin Rouge.

Don't be surprised if Tears Of A Clown is picked up by commercial producers.

Box office: 01423 502116.