Nostalgia time - it's not often that a stage set represents somewhere you've actually visited, but that's the case with Michael Holt's design for A Trip to Scarborough. His depiction of the foyer of the Royal Hotel, Scarborough, is a little less grand than the real thing, but its general ambiance is very much present. Appropriately, my own trip to Scarborough was to explore the town's art deco Odeon Cinema -- then derelict, and smelling unforgettably awful inside. Now the Odeon has been transformed into the Stephen Joseph Theatre, and it's from there that this production comes.

"Walls have ears", the proverb says. Hopefully in the case of the Royal Hotel foyer they have eyes too, for what colourful sights and sounds those foyer walls have witnessed down the centuries, if Alan Ayckbourn's play is to be believed. Richard Brinsley Sheridan was the first to use the title, and in 1982 Ayckbourn built his own play on to Sheridan's, setting it in three different periods, 1800, 1942, and 2008. Updates have been carried out for the revival. Scenes from the three dates are intercut with each other at lightning speed.

Confusing? You certainly get the feeling that Sir Alan is teasing the audience, and challenging you to keep up. All sorts of sub-plots are introduced, including a complete whodunnit: in 1942, the hotel manager and the head porter (Dominic Hecht and Adrian McLoughlin, an excellent double act, even if they do seem a little overfamiliar) suspect that a guest has murdered his wife. Meanwhile, drunken Flt Lt Faversham (Richard Stacey) has to be carted off to bed in unseemly fashion. In 1800, the foyer witnesses a duel during a rather overlong send-up of restoration comedy, while in 2008 an unscrupulous dealer (Terence Booth, splendidly smarmy) attempts to cheat one Holly Tunberry (Katie Foster-Barnes - pictured above) out of the true value of a manuscript found in Holly's ancestral home.

All this involves the excellent, 14-strong, ensemble cast in a great deal of instant accent switching, and miraculously fast costume changing. But above all the play has to be immaculately paced if it isn't to descend into a ragbag of sometimes irritatingly unresolved short scenes. And here this revival plays a trump card - it is directed by Alan Ayckbourn himself. In particular, an inspired take-off of the Andrews Sisters (Ben Lambert, Richard Stacey, and Marc Small) quite rightly brought the house down on opening night.

A Trip to Scarborough continues at the Oxford Playhouse tonight and tomorrow. Tickets: 01865 305305 (or www.oxfordplayhouse.com).