You may well have heard of Nikolai Gogol’s The Government Inspector. You may even have seen it performed. But I’m pretty sure you’ll never have experienced it quite like this: stuffed full of colour and movement, relocated from Imperial Russia to 1970’s USA… and reimagined as a fun-loving, high-stepping musical.

The storyline’s faithful to Gogol, albeit that the satire’s taken up a notch and knowingly ridiculous at times. We meet the mayor of a small provincial town and his retinue of minor functionaries, who are shocked out of their haze of complacent incompetence by news that an inspector may be in town. In the hotel down the road, a hopeless drifter with a DC accent is quickly misidentified as the man to please. The comedy of errors, the absurd love triangle, the rapid decline into outright corruption: all of the plot points from the 1836 original are present and correct.

Yet remarkably, they’re all delivered – not just in song – but with an energetic flurry of dance, acrobatic moves and audaciously high kicks. Everything’s choreographed to perfection, everything’s done with energy and style, and the attention to detail is utterly superb. Nobody, at any point, simply leaves the stage: each exit is its own beautifully-wrought comedy vignette.

The large cast of characters is gloriously vivid, too. It’s not just the colourful retro styling: each personality has a trademark manner and tics, faultlessly maintained throughout their time on stage. Everyone will have their own particular favourites, but I especially enjoyed local business duo Dobson and Bobson, one of whom – who knows which? – was endlessly upbeat, while the other sported the most impeccably of-its-time moustache.

For me, though, it all lacks a little variety. Musically, there are occasional surprises – I love how the visitors from Washington channel John Travolta, in contrast to the Eastern-European-inspired themes of the townsfolk – and there are brief nods to Broadway tropes, from the love-lorn duet to the character-defining spotlight number. Yet the production doesn’t fully commit to any of these departures, and quickly reverts to its trademark stage-filling set-pieces. Magnificent though those are, it gets a bit too much.

A sense of true peril is missing, too: in Gogol’s original the corrupt officials risk exile to Siberia, while in 1970’s America… well, it’s never quite explained. But none of this detracts from the sheer exuberance of the experience, nor the unfailing commitment of a large and talented cast. There’ll be no more entertaining way to encounter a classic – and you’re sure to leave energised, and humming a tune or two.