Leicester Haymarket has a new pre-show announcement. An unctuous voice comes over the loudspeaker system and, following the usual exhortation to switch off mobile phones, launches into a bizarre list of extra prohibitions. "All conditions must be respected. Non-compliers will be ejected. All appeals will be rejected."
I didn't think it would be possible to be more patronised. But then the play began.
Writer Noel Greig and director Kully Thiarai have concocted a heavily stylised vision of the future, dominated by a presidential megalomaniac known as the Primo, who has instigated a tyrannical social reform programme entitled the New Dawn. This acutely paranoid alternative Albion is a terrifying place, where everyone speaks very slowly in the third person and finishes each other's sentences. Heavy symbolism hangs ominously in the air, in the form of shipping containers, for example. Fugitives from the Primo's thought police are dispatched to the primordial ghetto of the Gladelands, where they are obliged to wear orange boiler suits and express their disaffection through modern dance.
Greig has a distinguished pedigree in educational theatre, which is a noble calling, but may also explain why the piece has been pitched at the intellectual level of a nine-year-old. "Don't blame the dead of the wars, blame the starters of wars," the cast intone gravely in unison. "Don't blame the victims of disease, blame the government. Pay attention at the back. Hands on heads."
Plague of Innocence deals with the big questions, the biggest of which being why a piece that would appear crass on a tour of local youth centres should be presented on the main stage of a major regional theatre. I searched in vain for confirmation that this was an educational project not intended for the Haymarket's regular patrons.
The piece offers a ringing endorsement of everything good and a stern admonition of anything evil. Its specific points remain much harder to fathom. I found this troubling, as I felt certain that there was bound to be a test afterwards.
· Ends tonight. Box office: 0116-253 9797.
