Malorie Blackman's novel, which Dominic Cooke has adapted and directed for the RSC, posits a society in which a white underclass, the Noughts, is pitted against a ruling black majority, the Crosses. The role-reversal, especially in the first half, pays off handsomely. We watch the growing friendship, across the race and class divide, between the 16-year-old Callum and the 14-year-old Sephy, whose father happens to be deputy prime minister. As the relationship matures, each pays a heavy price.
The script brings out the contradictions inherent in this kind of two-tier society, and the story has all kinds of disquieting resonances: at different times, one thinks of apartheid South Africa, sectarian Northern Ireland and, when a supermarket bomb kills innocent victims, recent events in London.
I found the tension slackened only when the story got closer to the obvious source of Romeo and Juliet, especially when Callum and Sephy's planned escape is aborted only by a stroke of bad luck. And though there are tensions within the rival families, the play depends too much on the idea of a unified black community: a myth that has lately been subverted by dramatists such as Roy Williams and Kwame Kwei-Armah.
But my qualms were stilled by the enormous visceral excitement of Cooke's production. And the acting is uniformly impressive. Richard Madden as the increasingly militant Callum and Ony Uhiara as the mutinous Sephy express the poignancy of doomed love.
Clearly, the play does not offer a realistic picture of modern Britain; but it still expresses disturbing truths about a society in which worth and status are determined by racial origins.
· Until February 2. Box office: 0844 800 1110.
A version of this review appeared in later editions of yesterday's paper.
