MANY COMEDIANS WOULD LIKE TO SEE THEMSELVES as the successors to Morecambe and Wise.  I've no idea whether Pluck, the classical-music comedy threesome from London, harbour such aspirations; but if they do, they're one of the few acts around who might genuinely stake a claim.  They are, first and foremost, talented musicians, as you have to be when your show involves playing the violin while putting up a deck-chair.  But they're masters of physical comedy too, with a repertoire ranging from subtle expressiveness to full-on slapstick; and for a few moments during The Titanic Show, I thought I saw the ghost of the great Eric walking on the stage.

The Titanic Show's paper-thin plot - a woman dresses up as a man and stows away in a cello case, all so she can join the band on board the doomed liner - does little more than link together a string of set-piece sketches; but to be honest, the sketches are so inspired, that's all it needed to do.  There's a tap-dancing peanut, Rule Britannia with party poppers, The Typewriter as you've never heard it before and, believe it or not, an Irish joke which actually is funny.  And the climatic capsize scene just grows more and more ridiculous, the trio playing on as progressively more outlandish objects fly across the stage.

The humour does revolve around two main themes: either one of the musicians ruins a number by playing badly, or all three solider on through a piece as all manner of mayhem happens around them.  But, if that renders many of the punchlines extremely predictable, it serves only to make them even funnier.

Over fifteen hundred people died on board the Titanic, and there's a question of taste about this show which can't be completely ignored.  But Pluck just about pass the test: the Nearer My God To Thee moment, when it comes, is sensitively and seriously done.  As the musicians walked off the darkened stage, I thought they'd just leave it at that.  But they didn't: there's a final, feelgood scene which, just maybe, the show would be better without.

But let's not focus too much on the grim.  Let's celebrate instead this unusual and engaging show, which successfully crosses genres and proves that not all serious classical musicians insist on taking themselves seriously.  Accessible, affable and very, very funny, Pluck have brought another highlight to this year's Fringe.