The Players are in a fight for survival

This is a play with a very different setting and involves trees, water set on a mysterious island in Derwentwater

Four out-of-condition, middle-aged businessmen sent off on a team-building exercise in the Lake District succeed in being the first people ever to get shipwrecked on an island on Derwentwater.

A water trough for spectacularly splashy entrances, a tree-top lookout and the island itself – is the scene for a wet and wild weekend outward-bound course that maroons four men in hostile territory.

Menaced by the wildlife and cut off from the world, this perfunctory middle-class exercise turns into a carnival of recrimination, French cricket and old sausages.

What should have been a bonding process for nasty Gordon, Angus who fears his wife is finding passion on the bread shelf in Sainsbury’s, Roy who loses his trousers but finds religion and Neville would-be leader trying to stop everyone losing the plot turns into a muddy, bloody fight for survival.

Neville’s Island started life at the Stephen Joseph Theatre in Scarborough.

Its creator has gone on to be one of the most highly regarded playwrights. His other work includes Calendar Girls, the musical version written with Gary Barlow, and the musical This is My Family which starred Sian Phillips.

This Masham Players presentation runs from Friday November 23 to Sunday November 24, daily at 7.30pm at Masham Town Hall.

Tickets £8 and £7 are available from Masham Community Office on 01765 680200.