Well, well, the cat seems to be among the pigeons. My esteemed editor has spent a painful time in the last fortnight wondering what he said in Issue 05 to produce such extreme reactions, inflamed by a spiteful little paragraph in the Standard's diary and a more interesting two-page spread in the Independent, followed by a series of interviews for Mr Shuttleworth in media sadly so obscure that few can have heard or read his response.

You may recall that he pointed to the age and durability of some of our leading reviewers, and wondered how younger ones were going to find a place in this overcrowded, underpaid market. This was taken as an attack on Ian's elders and betters, which anyone who actually read it will know it is not, any more than my own follow-up last issue was.

The good result of Ian's musings was that serious consideration has been given, in a few very public places, to the state of theatre criticism in Britain today. It is Theatre Record's privilege to give that consideration, however subliminally, every fortnight; it's a great pleasure to see it extended to a wider audience in the national press. (That the Indie piece gave Toby Young, who has had to bear plenty of jibes from fellow-critics including this one, the chance to comment on his colleagues' personal hygiene, was amusing, if not strictly to the point.)

The bad result was that it revealed, in more private places, the fragility of the egos of some of our critics. Over the years I've had some venomous personal responses to remarks, often light-hearted, in Prompt Comer, which have taught me that the folk who are not afraid to slaughter a playwright or an actor in print can be extremely sensitive to the slightest, er, slight on their own perceived merits. And as I've remarked before, the convention that theatre people do not respond publicly to bad, or indeed good reviews, is not one that appears to apply to their tormentors — see the letters columns passim. I hope there will be more wide-ranging debate about the state of criticism, here and better still elsewhere, in the weeks to come (and I'm sure the other Ian will print your letters, if he can find the space); I also hope that it will be free from spite and paranoia.

Shifting focus

Back to work. Just four shows to talk about in a lazy fortnight, but some interesting ones. Have you noticed that the focus of Fringe theatre is shifting? New arrivals like the Arcola and the Menier Chocolate Factory are becoming essential destinations, albeit usually to see visiting companies (come on, Mehmet, when do we get your next musical, or are you too busy in Turkey?); Jermyn Street and the Union are bravely trying to fill the musical gap left by the Bridewell, and Soho is seriously challenging the Court as a buzzy centre of new writing. Theatre 503 (which most us of will go on thinking of as the Latchmere) has developed a clever policy for new writers and now new directors, with a little help from mentors like the NT Studio and the Young Vic. The Finborough, too, has gained enormously in stature, attracting big actors to its small space. And coming up fast are the Gatehouse, the Landor and the White Bear, venues which once seldom attracted reviewers other than from the listings papers. Some of the recent credit for exploring the lesser known Fringe must go to Lloyd Evans, wheelclamper extraordinaire and intrepid cyclist, who does not always go for the easy commercial choices in his reviewing. More power to his frayed elbow. Let's also hear it for "old" Michael Billington, always ready to travel to where the good stuff is, in however downtrodden a venue, and bring back sympathetic reports.

Extra dimension

And so to Pyrenees, David Greig's new one at the Chocolate Factory, and one of the most enjoyable plays of the year to date. There's a special quality about Scots writing, not unrelated to the Canadians I was extolling a couple- of issues back: a willingness to look towards the universal in plays with a poetic core, an ability to produce an extra dimension on stage even when dealing with the gritty subject matter of the in-yer-face brigade. It doesn't always come off — it didn't, for me at least, in Sharman Macdonald's The Girl With Red Hair or Zinnie Harris's portentous but really rather tiny Midwinter. It doesn't always strike a chord with the London reviewers — who would, I think, respond more to Linda Maclean's Shimmer if they saw it in a more assured production. But when it works, as here, it's a joy. What is on the surface a run-of -the-mill lost memory play becomes a meditation on the power of language, a demonstration of the power of physical attraction, and a tantalising glimpse of healing powers we do not, maybe should not understand. And it's so essentially theatrical: watching the developing sexual chemistry between Hugh Ross, such a lovely, seriously underrated actor, and Frances Grey, a real discovery (whose short career, I note, includes David Harrower's Dark Earth, another of those near-misses) is spine-tinglingly exciting. I have this childish theory that plays succeed in proportion to the number of points of response they tap: the head, the heart, the genitals, the soul... Pyrenees scores remarkably high. (Intriguing footnote: In the thank-you section for Paines Plough's This Other England season, in which Pyrenees follows Mercury Fur, appears the name of Miranda Sawyer...)

Topical sideswipes

Lots of response points, too, for Tom Murphy's The Gigli Concert, beautifully revived at the Finborough with a cast to match Karel Reisz's 1992 Almeida production. I still recall the sheer sullen power of Tony Doyle's performance, one which is almost equalled by the normally cuddly Niall Buggy, whose smile here has a disturbing, switched-on feel about it, backed up by his near-manic bursts of laughter. Paul McGann and Catherine Cusack are also superb in this staging by Gavin McAlinden, who brought us the wonderful Gates of Gold last year. I don't think I understand it any more fully than I did at the Almeida, but I don't care: it stirred all sorts of pleasurable reactions, raised all sorts of unanswerable questions; and the privilege of watching such fine acting in close-up is, as Ms Sawyer points out, a rare one. It also carries its perils, as the Orange Tree's Previous Convictions sadly demonstrated. Alan Franks took a perennially useful topic, an inheritance squabble, and gave it a new resonance by revealing, shortly into the play, that the testator was still with us, even if only in a state of vegetation in a nursing home. The family feuds and secrets that then dribbled out had varying effects, because the author knew his characters so well that he neglected to tell us some vital things about them. The play gave him a useful opportunity to take a few amusing, topical sideswipes at government housing and health policy, but for all the sterling work of Michael Napier Brown's cast (notably the excellent, sad-eyed James Woolley) the action remained resolutely on the page — with lines that must have read well but when spoken became impossibly literary. It's a pity, because there was enough subtext there to put Franks in the vacant seat left by N C Hunter as "the English Chekhov". Our closeness to the actors cruelly emphasised this. Strangely enough, the previous Orange Tree show, Geoffrey Beevers' very faithful adaptation of Adam Bede, succeeded in being extremely theatrical, through its use of a Shared Experience storytelling style, while still offering us great chunks of verbatim George Eliot.

Deliberately static

Which leaves us with Hecuba. There have been some sniggering, rather schoolboy reviews of the RSC version — from the heaving shoulders beside me in the Albery I fear Mr Shuttleworth may produce another — but it does have a lot to commend it, I swear. Above all, I think we should respect the boldness of Laurence Boswell's attempt to offer us something closer to the Greek original, complete with singing chorus. This seems much more interesting, more challenging than messing about with masks, à la Peter Hall. I found the women very audible, Mick Sands' music subtle and not intrusive (he's done wonderful work in Greek tragedy before, for Katie Mitchell), with gentle Balkan elements reflecting the Thracian look of the costumes and geographic setting. Es Devlin's set, while a little reminiscent of the Stephane Braunschweig Measure For Measure and indeed a more recent Tom Piper Romeo And Juliet, had a fine monumental quality. Again, Tony Harrison's translation may not entirely come off, but the work of one of our major living poets deserves the respect that a strong cast gave it in this beautifully spoken staging. The deliberately static nature of the production might also deserve some recognition, and while Vanessa Redgrave may not have brought her usual inner self to the lead role, she did blend in with the chosen style. Nowhere did I see the tottering old crone Charlie Spencer pillories. There are times when you could wish for a little more seriousness in the critics' approach to serious matters — oh dear, there I go again...