You might expect this production from Polly Findlay, winner of the 2007 JMK Award for young directors, to be in the BAC's main house. Yet what Studio 2's more challenging environs show is Findlay's ability to take advantage of a small space. This is a vibrant production of Shakespeare's tale of star-crossed lovers, steeped in a shadowy darkness and simmering violence that one usually associates with Macbeth.
Tension and threat is everywhere. Against a backdrop of sparring adults and murderous teenagers, Jack Gordon's Byronic Romeo, who first appears as a surly, romantic figure from among bare trees, and Natasha Barrero's fully possessed, snarling, red-blooded Juliet (pictured, with Gordon), are no young innocents forced towards experience. Instead, they are children who from the start feel old before their time.
Findlay directs with astonishing nimbleness and fluency and is greatly helped by James Cotterill's ingenious wooden set. There's excellent support from Harry Hadden-Paton's Mercutio, a captivating mix of romantic disenchantment, cynicism and nihilism that catches Mercutio's many contradictions, and sly comedy from Daniel Millar's put-upon Peter. But what really impresses is how Findlay handles the play's melodramatic tendencies and overwrought emotions to produce a gripping, desolate, blood-freezing tragedy.
Until Aug 12, BAC, 176 Lavender Hill SW11,Tue to Sat 7.30pm, Sun 5.30pm, £10, £6 concs, Tue pay what you can. Tel: 020 7223 2223. Rail: Clapham Junction
Romeo And Juliet
Battersea Arts Centre
Lavender Hill, SW11 5TN
