For anybody seeking relationship advice with a lot of fun, this was the perfect show.

A married couple together for 25 years tore themselves apart to the brink of divorce before finding unexpected hope in Alton College’s Wessex Arts Theatre.

Professor Robert Stenk and Doctor Veronica Stenk, played by Jon and Katie Rand, were couple therapists with different approaches.

Psychology graduate Veronica knew the science and dealt with conflict calmly, while Robert favoured a straightforward and confrontational manner.

This contrast became apparent as they presented a talk and slideshow on how to be the perfect couple, causing mutual irritation and publicly exposing cracks in their marriage which turned into fault lines.

Jon and Katie, a married couple themselves, asked everyone in a relationship to put their hands up. Almost everybody was. Scanning the auditorium suggested most probably also had children. They got this stuff.

There was laughter as example arguments turned into real ones about domestic flashpoints - career rivalry, intimacy, parenting, mutual respect, washing up, football - and sharp intakes of breath at moments when everyone thought “Did they really say that?”

When Veronica walked out in exasperation, Robert delivered a touching monologue on how he felt about this woman he met in a university library. On the big screen was a picture from Robert’s phone of them taken shortly after they met. They looked like a sweet couple.

Football featured several times, first when a request for a conflict source received the suggestion “World Cup”. Robert became a Geordie who told fed-up Veronica he had to watch every game to relax after work.

A couple slide showed four examples of common goals. I liked the bottom left one, whose crossbar-to-ground stanchions looked perfect for making shots nestle in its net.

A rift in Robert and Veronica’s marriage was caused by the “blonde Scandinavian” - Professor Astrid Lundeberg, with whom Robert wrote a marriage book rather than doing so with his wife.

Fearing an affair, Veronica had not read his book. When Robert walked out, his phone screen on the big screen, a ringtone of A-ha’s Take On Me and a named picture of Astrid confirmed she was Norwegian - immaculate timing with England playing Norway in the World Cup the following night.

Veronica answered spitting blood but four minutes later her mood was transformed as Astrid said she admired Veronica’s work, denied an affair and asked to meet for dinner.

She insisted Veronica read Robert’s foreword, which turned out to be a tribute to Veronica and her influence on the book.

By the end Veronica and Robert remembered why they liked each other in the first place - even if she only went for a drink with him at the sixth time of asking.

Their final act was to ask couples in the audience to whisper one thing that they liked about their partner to each other.

That made everyone go home feeling happier about their other half - so however much the presentation veered away from their intentions, in marriage guidance terms Robert and Veronica did a grand job.

By Paul Coates