Theatre review Lyrical and awesome reminder of how brutality persists

It is not just heads that roll in Shakespeare's bloodiest drama.

- Arifa Akbar

It is not just heads that roll in Shakespeare's bloodiest drama. Hands and tongues are chopped off and bodies are mutilated until they are mere meat, then cooked and fed to loved ones, as we follow the fortunes of the Roman general Titus (Simon Russell Beale) after a triumphant campaign against the Goths.

The killing of his first prisoner and the subsequent marriage of Tamora, Queen of the Goths (Wendy Kweh) to the new emperor Saturninus (Joshua James) sets off a circuit of violence that raises the ante at every turn.

A metal grille around the stage for Max Webster's production suggests the imminent letting of blood. The first of the horrors – the dismembering of Tamora's son, limb by limb, even as she begs for mercy – takes place off stage, Greek-style. You hear his screams and the squelch of metal on flesh.