An American hostage in the Middle East reads aloud from the Qur'an: "To me my religion, to you your religion." Frank McGuinness's 1992 play seems prescient now: its preoccupation with racial stereotypes and the mutual misunderstanding of western and Islamic cultures speaks directly to us.
Andrew Flynn's production, first seen in Galway three years ago, emphasises the physical discomfort of its three characters, held hostage in Lebanon. An American doctor (Paul Roe), a Northern Irish journalist (Diarmuid de Faoite) and an English academic (Rod Goodall) are chained to the wall on a small circular stage. Designed by Owen McCarthaigh as a claustrophobic dungeon where they cannot tell night from day, it is overlooked by a narrow window through which the shape of one of their captors can occasionally be glimpsed.
While the script's humour is fully exploited by this excellent cast, the production has a dark tone, which seems appropriate to the charged geopolitical climate. The fear that they might not survive is evident, even amid the banter, sparring and absurd comic fantasies they invent to pass the hours. De Faoite - looking strikingly like Brian Keenan - brings an aggressive edge to his character as he taunts the newly arrived Englishman, Michael (Goodall). There is a tense silence in the audience at the angry outburst from Adam (Roe): "I want to kill an Arab and see their faces filled with hate."
Flynn's direction allows the relationships between the men a full range of emotions: intense dislike as well as need, empathy and love, expressed in tiny gestures of physical intimacy. As he is left alone in the gloom, Goodall's gesture of outstretched arms affirms the play's portrayal of compassion and courage.
· Until November 16. Box office: 02890 381081. Then touring.
