MICK MCSHANE is roused by a band whose socialism laces every line of every song with commitment and raw passion
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Bloody good
GORDON PARSONS meditates on the appetite of contemporary audiences for the obscene cruelty of Shakespeare’s Roman nightmare
BLOODBATH: Simon Russell Beale (centre) as Titus Andronicus / Pic: Marc Brenner
New releases from Mountain, Soul Asylum and Michael McDermott
ALEX HALL is disgusted by the misuse of ‘emotional narratives’ to justify uninformed geo-political prejudice
SUE TURNER welcomes a thoughtful, engaging book that lays bare the economic realities of global waste management
JOHN GREEN welcomes an insider account of the achievements and failures of the transition to democracy in Portugal
SIMON PARSONS applauds an imaginative and absorbing updating of Strindberg’s classic
PETER MASON is enthralled by an assembly of objects, ancient and modern, that have lain in the mud of London’s river
Titus Andronicus
The Swan Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon
★★★★
GIVEN the fact that Shakespeare’s early revenge tragedy, after its initial success, disappeared from the stage for 300 years, its revival since the mid-20th century must reflect something about our contemporary world.
History has always been violent but as far as most people not directly involved are concerned that’s exactly what it is, history. Today, however, we see and experience that violence in all its horror virtually as it happens through daily television news.
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GORDON PARSONS relishes a fast moving production of Sheridan’s comic masterpiece
