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Description: Leslie Grantham and Peter Martin star in this stage adaptation of the classic comedy series, recreating the misadventures of the Home Guard, including episodes that were erased by the BBC.
Trains: BR: Hackney Central 
Phone: 0208985 2424
Website: www.hackneyempire.co.uk
Email: info@hackneyempire.co.uk
Extra info: Pub
Falling into line: Privates Walker and Pike (Leslie Grantham and Thomas Richardson) are put through their paces at the Hackney Empire by Captain Mainwaring (Timothy Kightley)
If you always wanted to see Dad's Army in the flesh, don't panic, as Corporal Jones would say. Just march to the Hackney Empire, where the Walmington-on-Sea Home Guard is currently billeted. The original cast might have mostly gone to the great barracks in the sky but these raw recruits largely pass muster.
What you get for your ration coupons are four sitcom episodes. Two classics and two which were scandalously erased by the BBC.
In the first, Private Frazer is promoted and becomes power-crazed, in the second Private Walker has to avoid the call-up. In the third Captain Mainwaring is demoted, in the fourth the platoon guards a captured U-Boat crew.
While Leslie Grantham has star billing as black marketeer Walker, there are no concessions to the former EastEnder, who swaggers in his spiv suit without ever hogging the limelight.
Timothy Kightley does the bulk of the work as Captain Mainwaring and, while slightly lacking in the self-importance department, if you squint, he is a dead ringer for Arthur Lowe.
The supporting cast is variable. David Warwick is no John Le Mesurier, though when he tugs his earlobe and mutters "Well, well, well", Sergeant Wilson is back on parade.
Richard Tate is a credible, diminutive Jones, Thomas Richardson's Pike captures the sick-note whinge. But Kern Falconer is too manic for gloomy Frazer and Brian Jackson's Godfrey too debonair.
Jimmy Perry and David Croft's original scripts are creaky by today's attention deficit disorder sensibilities, yet they still stand up. There is depth, too.
When Mainwaring loses his pips and joins the ranks there is a genuine flash of pathos. Much in the same way one might sit through Hamlet waiting for that soliloquy, this enjoyable revival spends two hours building up to "Don't tell him, Pike".
But there are other nostalgia-inducing highlights. I defy anyone not to smile when Jones says: "They don't like it up 'em". Who do you think you are kidding, Little Britain, if you think you invented the catchphrase?
• Until 23 February (020 8985 2424, www.hackneyempire.co.uk).
Details are correct at the time of publication - please check with venue before booking.
