IT'S a big-time event in Hell's University; a lecture by Mephisto himself, with a major segment shown in real time, right up there with the action. The subject is the capture of Faust, with actors helping to recreate the history of the thing, and the grand finale - the actual foreclosure on the mortgage, as it were - taking place before the students' eyes.

Shrewd readers will already have copped that the audience constitutes the student body and that the structure of the play - The Mephisto Lecture, at the City Arts - falls neatly into two acts. Authors Lee Molloy and Simon King have written a clever comedy with an intriguing difference, a satanic skit with a neat line in anachronism.

This Faust is a bit of a wimp, despite his reputation down below as a very desirable property. He is egotistic and venal, and not really very clever at, the bargaining, which takes place on a TV game show called "Let's Make A Deal". He winds up with a bagful of illusions, including a Marilyn Monroe with hairy legs and a diabolic chuckle, for whom he deserts his girlfriend, Helen.

It might all seem like a foregone conclusion, but clients have a nasty habit of last-minute repentance, and Mephisto has to be careful. After a final foray by Helen seeking to use her love for redemption purposes, the charm's wound UP and all debts are settled.

Simon King trundles this ingenious comic vehicle along at a lively pace and with some originality in the staging. His lead actor, Pepe Roche, plays Mephisto with a physical and vocal gravitas spiked with moments of pure mischief; an excellent performance. Jude Sweeney is suitably distrait as Faust, Annie Warburton is the lovelorn Helen, and Roisin Kearney with Vincent Patrick Smith are fine as a duo of diabolic acolytes. Between them they create an engaging fiction.