You can do likewise with the National's summer hit, Medea, on September 4, with Helen McCrory in the role of literature's premier child-murderess. The run was unsatisfyingly short but a quality rendition of a hard play to like. We first hear Medea screaming offstage at being ditched by Jason (Danny Sapani), "a he-devil" played as a silky opportunist. Carrie Cracknell's production gives the character a human face as a woman whose vengeance has been in part constructed by the unpitying world around her.  

McCrory's Medea is by turns irrational, noble and desperate, emptied of pity and feeling. The truly outstanding aspect of the production is the slowing down of movement in the final scenes (outstanding chor-eography by Lucy Guerin) to evince a balletic world of shadows and forests, echoing the darker recesses of the character's disturbed mind. Like Blanche, Medea has to make us believe that madness is a fit response to her predicament. McCrory leaves us with shaken moral certainties and a fraught empathy. 

The only way to go from Greek tragedy at this pitch is to the sunny side of the street. Even so, your critic embarked on an outing to the Menier Chocolate Factory's Forbidden Broadway with the trepidation of one who has a limited tolerance for musicals, comedy revues and any combination of the two. 

Fortunately, this deft tapestry of skits guarantees squawks of mirth from the first minute to the curtain call. A cast of just four — Anna-Jane Casey, Sophie-Louise Dann, Damian Humbley and Ben Lewis-accompanied by a demonically energetic music-hall pianist, parodies stars, flops, hoofers and impresarios with verve and bite. 

In the best of the recurring sketches, the giddy revolve of Les Misérables is presented simply by the actors shuffling dead-eyed in a circle, while adapting those famous Kretzmer lyrics to reflect the tedium of a hit grown stale: "The only show in town with its own pension plan." A shouty Miss Saigon gets a big fat slap, with toy helicopters, increasingly incredible happenstances and a resigned chorus: "We've become/Vietnumb."

Forbidden Broadway started out as an in-joke in the early 1980s and the targets of its ire, from greedy producers to the corporate takeover of musicals and grinding homogeneity of style in commercial theatre, still hold good. It takes some brave potshots at the famous. Sam Mendes's soulless Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is royally mocked: "Come with us/to a world/of no imagination," croon the cast with sweet savagery. The coldly commercial calculation behind The Book of Mormon gets quite a swipe too.

But Forbidden Broadway is saved from being merely sardonic by a love of the business it sends up. Liza Minnelli's hyper-activity and near-miss high notes are parodied with bright affection, as are Sondheim's convoluted librettos in a thesaurus-laden tribute, "Into the Words". 

The Menier deserves a standing ovation for making its niche of intelligent musical theatre so consistently engaging. Forbidden Broadway is transferring to the West End shortly. I hope it feels as joyous on a bigger stage. Like all forbidden fruit from the Adam and Eve show onwards, I confidently predict that there will be a taste for it.