THRILLER writer Peter James is keen to point out that his creation Roy Grace is HMQ Camilla’s favourite detective, and it is he who leads the investigation in Picture You Dead, the seventh and latest James novel to be dramatised for the theatre, touring the UK until the end of July.

Mr James, whose Brighton-based sleuth (played by John Simm) leads the TV series based on the books, is heralded by some as the 21st century Agatha Christie, so he’s fairly certain of a packed and devoted audience for his plays, and so it was at Bath this week. Picture You Dead, a clever title that not only allows many references to art fraud but also allows him to threaten any member of the audience whose mobile phone rings, is a neatly plotted story full of colourful characters, performed by a (large these days) cast of nine plus two understudies.

The book has been adapted by Shaun McKenna, and is directed by Jonathan O’Boyle, with a special credit for real-life copyist David Henty, who worked with Peter James on the original premise. Adrian Linford’s set has to incorporate a suburban house, a manor full of old masters, an artists studio and a police station.

There are twists and turns to this story of a couple whose £20 car boot sale artwork purchase turns out to be a Fragonard original, but no real tension, and what there is collapses in misbehaving sets and unconvincing physical violence. The performances range from plausible and authentic to end-of-the-pier summer show. The direction sometimes looks as though the actors are walking through a TV studio to the next soundstage. Overall, it is so old fashioned, with sets, particularly the generics artworks on the manor house walls (Ore Oduba’s ruthless, obsessive art collector would not display his precious collection like this), some 21st century words thrown in for camouflage.

Well done to Mark Oxtoby as Dave the gone-straight forger, Jodie Steele as a stylish and versatile femme very fatale, Fiona Wade as the unfortunate wife of the builder who bought the painting, and George Rainsford as a more convincing Grace than is sometimes portrayed.

It is on at the Theatre Royal until Saturday, when the main house goes into waiting for Ralph Fiennes’s summer season, starting with the new play Grace Pervades, which opens on 27th June and runs to 19th July.

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Photographs by  Chris Bishop