You might have spotted Brian Stewart lurking around the water cooler in BBC2's The Office at some point during the series or, more alarmingly, even with his kegs off.

For the creator of Killing Castro used to be an actor and while working alongside Ricky Gervais and co, had to pull off all manner of cringeworthy stunts to earn his bread and butter.

It is no wonder he ditched acting to write full time. "It was a great thrill," says Brian. "The Office is a brilliant piece of writing and I think its success is fully justified. I loved being part of it but there was a lot of sitting around as well, which could be tedious."

Focussed on writing in his spare time, the idea for Killing Castro first emerged back in 1998.

Inspired by incredible but true events and real people, the play is essentially a comedy which sends up the CIA's notorious failed attempt to assassinate Fidel Castro on the eve of his visit to New York for a United Nations meeting in September 1960, just before the Kennedy-Nixon presidential election.

It is set at the agency's headquarters, where four bumbling officials hatch outrageous plans to get rid of the dictator before communism, a perceived threat to everything the United States stands for, spreads through Latin America.

They discuss causing Castro's death by means of an exploding cigar, a poisonous snake sent through the mail, poisoning the famous Castro beard and even attempting to engineer the second coming of Christ to undermine him.

Unsurpris-ingly, their ill-thought-out plans go horribly and hilariously wrong.

"Post 9/11, the play has become more relevant and topical," says Brian. "The US government's current gung ho approach to handling foreign provocation is, in many ways, history repeating itself. It mirrors the imperialist way they treated Cuba in the late Fifties and early Sixties.

"But it is not about USA-bashing," he adds. "It is partly about the way the USA deals with any threat to its power, its business interests worldwide.

Lessons could have been learned from what happened 40 years ago, but they haven't been.

"On another level, it is just about the insanity of the ideas that were generated."

Cast includes Clive Mantle, (Casualty, The Vicar Of Dibley), Edward Hardwicke (Sherlock Holmes) and Michael Praed (Robin Of Sherwood, Dynasty)

Starts 7.45pm (Thurs and Sat mats 2.30pm). Tickets £15-£24. Call 08700 606 650