As the theatregoing community dives into its annual flurry of Fringe-mania, with burgeoning new voices and shows dotting every nook, cranny and corner of Edinburgh, it’s always worth remembering that the Celtic capital does not hold a monopoly on indie productions. Birmingham’s Old Joint Stock Theatre has proven itself a cultural hotspot of original and in-house pieces, including the serving up of shows rarely seen on the UK circuit.

First Date is a perfect tentpole example of this. Winsberg, Zachary and Weiner’s spunky rom-com represents a shiny UK premiere for the Birmingham venue. Outside of a Samantha Barks and Simon Lipkin-headed digital version streamed during lockdown, this is the first time First Date has been performed this side of the Atlantic, and it proves a canny fit for the Old Joint Stock.

Whilst not quite a two-hander, Date centres around, unsurprisingly, a blind date match up for awkward, overdressed Aaron (Michali Dantes) and spirited yet guarded Casey (Rokaya). The intimacy of the Old Joint Stock’s theatre allows the creatives here to perfectly transform it into ‘Cupidz’, the New York bar-restaurant where the show takes place. Plenty of credit to designers Joanne Marshall and Jacob Finch for crafting a really palpable sense of place and ambience. Kitschy neon signs, an actual bar and Tom McVeigh’s vibrant yet stylised city backdrop invites audiences into the world of First Date, and it’s impossible to shake the sense that you’re sat in the thick of the action.

And what colourful, zany, inspired action it is. For despite its closeness and intimacy, the five performers who head up First Date do a seriously impressive job of making this register as full throated musical theatre.

In many ways, the MVPs here are the triad of supporting performers – Tom Kiteley, Lowri Hamer and Joey Warne – who spin, cartwheel and even death drop their way through a panoply of wildly different and tirelessly entertaining characters and bit parts. The catty, increasingly impatient gay best friend. The deified ex fiancé. In a vein similar to, say, the thought avatars of A Strange Loop, many of the trio’s characters are embodiments of friends, former lovers and other parts of the leading duo’s psyches lending voice to how this fractious first encounter is transpiring. Some may balk at how some of the characterisations tiptoe a little awkwardly close to slightly dated tropes, but when you’re having this much fun with it all, such criticism feels cynical.

First Dates is perhaps at its strongest and most infectious when it lets the freewheeling, bonkers elements of its story run riot – from a sidesplitting showdown of conflicting religious authorities, the hyperactive puppetry of an imaginary son through to the literal physical embodiment of Google itself putting on a vaudevillian song and dance number.

“…perhaps at its strongest and most infectious when it lets the freewheeling, bonkers elements of its story run riot…”

Director James Edge asks a lot of his company throughout, threading constant movement (shoutout to a particularly inspired idea to have the characters be ‘served’ the props for their upcoming scenes and numbers), energy and vibrancy through a piece that is essentially about two people sat down getting to know one another. As mentioned, the talented group more than rise to the challenge, and thoroughly impress in turning the big show tunes and numbers into really substantial and entertaining musical set pieces.

In fact, the showier and sillier moments of First Date are so winning that they regularly threaten to overshadow the more formulaic romance at its heart. Thankfully, Michali Dantes and Rokaya are both in fine voice, and do a good job of fleshing out their leads over the course of the two hour piece, dipping into some genuinely touching territory come the second act in particular. There’s a definite arc and growth to these contrasting yet complementary characters, and we come to share in Aaron’s gradual empowerment and Casey’s slow yet determined breaking down of her defensive barriers.

“…there can’t be enough good things said about the absolute delight that is that supporting trio.”

Strip it to its bare bones, and there isn’t all that much that is devastatingly original or new in First Date. Yet Edge and company inject it with enough character that we actually come to care, and there can’t be enough good things said about the absolute delight that is that supporting trio. Kiteley, Hamer and Warne prove themselves chameleonic physical and character comedians par excellence, and in no small way help to elevate the formulaic into the fabulous, and the intimate into something frequently impressive.