Insane asylum

Before this collaborative production between the RSC and Cardboard Citizens has even begun, the audience are asked to 'sign in' - a process intended to recall the first stage of an asylum application.

Given that the venue - a dispiriting warehouse - is frequently used as a homeless day centre, this production of Pericles is as much concerned with highlighting the modern experience of dispossession as it is exploring the play's own depiction of it.

Adrian Jackson's promenade production, which ushers the audience from room to room in itinerant pursuit of wandering Pericles, leaves plenty of space for personal testimony. Real-life case histories of asylum seeking are grafted on to sections of the play via film footage, first-person reportage - and, in some of the most effective moments, through narrative connections with the play itself. (Thaisa's 'death' at sea, for example, powerfully recalls the recent death of Indonesian refugees off the coast of Australia.)

Jackson's sprawling design doesn't improve on the play's own disordered structure, while some of the video projections and performances are inaudible. It boasts some fine acting from Christopher Simpson and Kevork Malikyan as the young/old Pericles, however - if a Pericles production stands or falls on the reunion scene between Pericles and Marina, then this one stands admirably.

For all its flaws, Jackson's tough reworking is to be applauded: in this production Shakespeare's magical fairy tale becomes a wholly modern newspaper report of tragedy - and redemption. Claire Allfree

In rep until Aug 10 (next perf tomorrow), The Warehouse, 5 Mandela Way SE1, 7.45pm, Sat mats 3pm, Sun Aug 6 and 10 4pm, £14, £8 concs.

Tel: 020 7638 8891. www.barbican.org.uk Tube: Bermondsey/Borough