In the age of Waking the Dead, Prime Suspect or Cracker and where every 7.30pm soap boasts a Sean Slater, a Richard Hillman or a David Platt, a boy who blinds horses must seem like a lightweight in the psycho stakes.

And in a world where sex sells just about everything and the God of Christianity has become something of a joke, even the play's potential to shock in the combination of those two themes is undoubtedly diluted.
In fact, what Shaffer's story most resembles is a Barbara Vine bestseller, with its mix of family secrets, sexual passion and repression.

Yet for all that it might now appear extremely familiar and even passé, this revival by Thea Sharrock remains a compelling piece of theatre, fascinating even when it seems obvious.

Alfie Allen's tormented adolescent Alan Strang is a powerful presence with the face of a fallen angel, a disturbing blend of the naïve and the volatile, with flashes of innocence and complexity that make him all the more interesting.

You would never expect Simon Callow to be anything less than an imposing presence, but here he uses his theatricality to marvellous effect, finding humour and warmth, despair and compassion in a piece that could too easily slip into verbosity.

Strong support too from Linda Thorson as the magistrate who puts Callow's psychiatrist onto the boy's case, Laura O'Toole as the girl whose actions act as a catalyst for emotional disaster and Colin Hurley and Helen Anderson as the parents who, perhaps almost too predictably, hold the key to the tragedy.

Impressively stylised and never less than gripping, this is a welcome revival that demonstrates that while Shaffer's story may perhaps have lost its power to shock, it has certainly not lost its power to hold and ultimately move its audience.
John Highfield


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