TRACIE Bennett’s high octane portrayal of Judy Garland in the dog days of her career - a point to which we will return - may make you wonder: what is she on?

Adrenaline, no doubt. It is an extraordinary performance, worthy of the superstar Garland in her heyday and also of the Olivier Award for which the superb Bennett was nominated.

But adrenaline was never enough for the woman who was Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz.

Fed pills as a child star to keep her going (as she recalls, she could have flown along the yellow brick road, never mind skipped) she became addicted to uppers and downers and, in later life, the booze and fags that enabled her to meet the demands of a showbusiness career.

We meet her newly arrived in a London hotel suite with husband-to-be Mickey Deans (Norman Bowman) and pianist Anthony (Hilton McRae) who is also her gay best friend.

There is - at the insistence of club boss Deans - to be a run at the Talk of the Town, a chance for Judy to shine.

But the aura of a dodgy swansong hangs over the enterprise.