Romeo, Romeo...why art thou bothering, Romeo?

A VOGUISH young movie star, onstage cameras, microphones placed conspicuously around a bare stage as well as taped to the actors' cheeks, smoke, blinding flashes of white light, a continuous background hum as of a trapped hornet - how quickly the trademarks of a Jamie Lloyd production have become clichéd and predictable.

- NEIL NORMAN

Editing the text to suit his vision and cutting "extraneous" characters, Lloyd has fashioned what he imagines to be an adaptation for the era.

But the intelligence and imagination that went into his similarly radical versions of Cyrano and Sunset Blvd are entirely absent here.

Gestures

Giant close-ups of shiny faces, live feeds from backstage and even scenes shot in the foyer are mere technical gestures, conceptual liggers who bring nothing to the party.

As Romeo, Tom Holland is a charisma-free zone, achieving the unlikely feat of being both buff and weedy.