Watching Andrew Hilton's engrossing production, it is hard to understand why Shakespeare's play has been so neglected. True, it is a banquet of blood-letting, rape, murder and mutilation - but, as Hilton proves, it is much more than some 17th-century spatter-movie. Its themes of revenge and retribution, and a cycle of violence that leads only to more blood-letting until families are wiped out and the state totters, remains pertinent, not least because of the protagonists' highly developed sense of self-righteousness about their bloody acts. This may rob the characters of tragic status, but the drama nevertheless has moments of great tragedy: Titus' discovery of his ravished and mutilated daughter Lavinia, alone in the forest like a wounded doe, is full of pity and horror.
Hilton transposes the play to the 18th century, so that the bewigged finish of the men and the formality of the music offer a sharp contrast to the chaos that ensues as Rome is transformed into "a wilderness of tigers". The artistic director is known for his restraint, and here it plays dividends, keeping the grand guignol and the giggles in check as the body count rises.
The extent to which Shakespeare makes women and blacks (the Goth queen Tamora and her Moor lover Aaron) shoulder most of the blame may be uncomfortable to modern sensibilities. But neither Shakespeare nor Hilton shirks from showing how disaster stems from Titus Andronicus' initial foolish lack of compassion and justice.
Looking like Antony Worrall Thompson, Bill Wallis as Titus cooks up vengeance effectively, although his easy, conversational style of speaking is sometimes indistinct. But the acting honours belong to the women, with Lucy Black steely and sexy as Tamora and Catherine Hamilton heartbreaking as the maimed and voiceless Lavinia.
· Until March 18 Box office: 0117-902 0344
