Flesh Wound Royal Court, London. RATING: FOUR STARS

Tamzin Outhwaite as Deirdra: 'a wondrous mix of abrasive toughness and residual decency as if a sacred heart still beats under her shiny tracksuit.'

 Appearances are deceptive. You could easily take Che Walker's second Royal Court play as a standard piece of "in yer face" theatre. But, although it's undeniably visceral, in the end it's a sharp-witted study of sentimentalised violence and the use of language as a form of moral camouflage. Walker's setting is a grotty, high-rise, north London flat occupied by Deirdra who keeps a crucifix on her wall and whose vocabulary is robustly Catholic. Her peace, however, is rudely shattered by the arrival of a burly, heavy, Joseph, claiming to be the long-lost father of her half-brother, Vincent. It would seem that Vincent has impregnated the half-wit daughter of one of the Camden Calderazzo gang; and Joseph's apparent mission is to protect his errant boy from the murderous wrath of the local mafia.

There's a touch of Pirandello about the initial encounter between Joseph and Deirdra in that we are up against our old friend, the relativity of truth; or at least the unguessable truth about one's relatives. But, with the arrival of the blood-stained Vincent, Walker's play turns into an acute study of the simultaneous softness and cruelty of the fringe criminal classes. WS Gilbert's cut-throat, who "loves to hear the little brook a-gurgling" has nothing on Joseph who, having broken his son's fingers, goes all gooey about the baby the boy has fathered. It is Walker's language, however, that really excites: the characters cover base actions with fastidious phrases in a manner reminiscent of Joe Orton. "Vincent, I really think you're being a little exuberant about this," claims Deirdra, as her half-brother threatens to blow his father's brains out or tip him over the apartment's ledge. And when Vincent is accused of having raped the backward Calderazzo daughter, he cries: "I got demons." What Walker pins down precisely is a community with a half-remembered morality and a belief that words can excuse criminal deeds. Wilson Milam's Theatre Upstairs production shows the same relish for comedic violence he exhibited in The Lieutenant of Inishmore and the three actors exactly convey the characters' muddled morality. Tamzin Outhwaite invests Deirdra with a wondrous mix of abrasive toughness and residual decency as if a sacred heart still beats under her shiny tracksuit. And Michael Attwell as the crooked patriarch, and Andrew Tiernan as his abusive son cozily suggest that the family that preys together stays together. Walker's plotting may be a bit shaky, but he captures perfectly the gap between words and actions amid the Camden Town gang.

Romeo and Juliet. Rating: Oxford Playhouse

Photo: Alexandra Gilbreath

English Touring Theatre and its director Stephen Unwin have a real knack of spotting talent on the way up. It was with this company that almost 10 years ago a young Alan Cumming played Hamlet and Alexandra Gilbreath was a fearsomely young Hedda Gabler; in the last few years some of the best of our younger generation of classical actors-Emma Cunniffe, Daniel Evans and Mark Bazeley-have first made their mark with ETT. Now we have two more names to add to the list: Adam Croasdell and Laura Rees who as the lovers Romeo and Juliet make what is often Shakespeare's dullest play seem surprisingly sprightly. There is also a rather good and highly entertaining Jamaican Mercutio from O.T. Fagbenle.

 For all its talk of love and passion, the trouble with most Romeo and Juliets is that they are severely anemic, lacking in genuine tragic intensity. Most directors realise that Shakespeare hadn't quite got his act together when it came to editing and tightening his own work, and that by the time the play drags towards a close half the audience will be silently willing the lovers to die as quickly as possible so they can get to the pub before last orders. It is not for nothing that it is one of the most likely Shakespeare plays for a director to employ either a concept or a gimmick.