Begging to differ

It's London in the 1700s, but the population speaks a mix of Zulu, Afrikaans, English and Xhosa. Criminals are incarcerated in Newgate, but they also sing ballads with a reggae beat. There are public hangings at Tyburn, but there are drum'n'bass riffs too. It's the early 18th century, Jim, but most definitely not as we know it.

Ibali LooTsotsi The Beggar's Opera is the latest piece to come from Wilton's Music Hall, which produced the multi-language smash-hit Yiimimangaliso The Mysteries last year. Devised and performed by the same creative team, Ibali LooTsotsi is a re-working of John Gay's scabrously cynical musical comedy The Beggar's Opera, famous for its dashing antihero Macheath and its clear-eyed depiction of financial and moral corruption. The piece has been in rehearsal in South Africa (where the cast is from and where director Mark Dornford-May is based) and begins previews on Thursday night.

I caught up with the charismatic music director Charles Hazlewood on his return from South Africa and asked him why the company had chosen The Beggar's Opera for its next venture. 'After The Mysteries, Mark and I wanted to find another show which had some relevance to the situation in the UK and to South Africa,' he says. 'And the essential truth of The Beggar's Opera, of course, is that the rich commit as many crimes as poor people, but rich people get away with it and poor people don't. You've only got to drive around the Western Cape in South Africa to see fabulous luxury next door to the worst shanty towns you can imagine; to see the stark truth of that.' How far has the show been adapted? 'We've turned it upside down, pulled it apart, ripped it to shreds and then spliced it together again,' he says with relish. 'We've cut lots out and re-ordered scenes.'

In addition to its political message, Gay's 'ballad opera' also offers great opportunities to a lyric company. When it was written (in 1728), the English folk tradition was in rude health, and the author included 69 popular melodies of the day, confident that the audience would be familiar with them and would be drawn in by them. Hazlewood has kept 45 numbers in the show and mostly utilised the same tunes that Gay used - but with a twist. 'I've re-thought them, using all the kinds of music you hear on the streets in South Africa - from American pop to Zulu choral music to reggae. The English folk tradition has died, but the South African one is extremely healthy - so Gay's piece is perfect for this setting.'

This work, as with The Mysteries, will be performed in four languages. How was this achieved? 'We would start the rehearsals in English and make sure the meaning of any scene was absolutely clear. Then we would find ways to incorporate the other languages, until it was fully mixed. But the songs will all still be in English.'

Musically, Ibali LooTsotsi promises to be an extravaganza of percussion. Hazlewood has asked the cast to play everything from Djembe drums ( calfskin drums which can be tuned) through American thumb-pianos, to a custom-built set of five marimbas which, he promises, 'will make your trousers flap'.

One of the most remarkable things about Yiimimangaliso The Mysteries was the tight sense of ensemble that the cast produced. Both Dornford-May and Hazlewood hope Ibali LooTsotsi will build on this achievement. 'The Mysteries showed Mark and me that we wanted to continue working in throughscored ensemble theatre, where there's never any sense of anyone leaving the space. We found that the actors in any particular scene always give a more passionate and truthful account of it if they're surrounded by the others. Ours is a very rough-and-ready kind of theatre, but it's more about the whole than any individual.'

The Beggar's Opera, with its mix of bawdy comedy, gallows humour and odd amorality, has always been a tough nut to crack: but if anyone can do it, it certainly sounds like this company can.

In rep from Thu until Dec 13, Wilton's Music Hall, 1 Graces Alley E1, Mon to Sat 7.30pm, £15 to £22.

Tel: 0870 840 1111. Tube: Aldgate East/Tower Hill