The boundaries of modern drama may not be broken in this revival of Sam Shepard's showdown between two brothers, but Wilson Milam's bravado production rounds off a season that has put the Old Vic back in the premier league of regional theatres.
Shepard's play is a rewrite of David Miller's 1962 western Lonely Are the Brave, which sees ex-con cowboy Kirk Douglas finding that the horse is no match for sheriff Walter Matthau's Jeep and helicopters. Heavy-drinking thief Lee is pitted against younger brother Austin, the embodiment of the American dream with his wife, kids, Ivy League education and successful career as a screenwriter. On the verge of his big break, Austin is house-sitting his mother's home in LA when Lee rolls up out of the desert like a bad mirage. Soon the pretty house is trashed and the brothers stage their own version of Gunfight at the OK Corral.
At stake here are two visions of the American male: the antisocial outlaw, hungry but free as he rides off into the sunset and towards a future of no teeth and cirrhosis of the liver; and the prosperous, technology-dependent all-American man peddling stories for the Hollywood dream factory. Neither is very attractive, and the central image is of two men lost in a vast prairie as they endlessly chase each other.
Phil Daniels as Lee and Andrew Tiernan as Austin are both dynamite, and this is a powerful indictment of what it takes to be a man in the land where the myth has turned sour.
· Until November 22. Box office: 0117-987 7877
