HAVING conquered the West End, The Play What I Wrote, the brilliantly conceived multi award-winning tribute to England's greatest comedy double act Morcambe and Wise, is out on the road and heading for Poole.

The show, which opens for a six night run at Lighthouse on Monday revolves around a washed up double act who look to the legacy of Eric and Ernie for inspiration. They have a play 'what they wrote' but they need a guest star. Who will it be? And that, in a nutshell is, what it's all about. Clive Hayward and Kim Wall play the hapless comedy duo while Andy Williams is their mate. The guest star? Well that's anyone's guess.

In the West End the great and the good were clamouring to appear Sting, Kylie Minogue, Ewan McGregor, Dawn French, Joanna Lumley, Will Young, Ralph Fiennes and even Sir Ian McKellen (an in-joke for those who know the show) all made surprise appearances.

Who turns up at Poole will remain firmly under wraps until the curtain goes up every night.

"I think people expect us to use local celebrities but we don't, we just go for quite established people," said Clive Hayward.

I met Clive, together with Kim Wall and Andy Williams, after a performance at the Mayflower in Southampton in October. The guest star on that occasion had been Brian Conley. Earlier in the week they had shared a stage with Honor Blackman and then Nigel Havers.

Guest stars spend four hours in London working with the shows director and choreographer and are then dispatched to whatever theatre for their guest spot. "We rehearse for a few hours and then just run them into the show," said Kim.

Not surprisingly perhaps the cast don't have an unpleasant word to say about any of their illustrious guests.

"The thing that really strikes us is that, however famous they are, just how much they're like any other performer, with the same concerns and worries about the practicalities of the staging of the show," said Clive

"One thing I can tell you is that we've never had a guest star whose been difficult. They want to be there because there's nothing like the buzz of live laughter and they have enormous fun."

Andy believes the guest star is absolutely crucial to the success of the show. That way it's always evolving, it changes with each new guest. It's a very special piece of theatre."

Kim feels it shows how much a part of our cultural heritage Morcambe and Wise are. "They are absolutely woven into our comedy bones. that's why I think it's a very cleverly written play. There's no attempt at impersonation, it's beyond that really."

The Play What I Wrote runds until to Saturday 01202 685222.