Edward II

Christopher 'Kit' Marlowe was a playwright, poet, spy, atheist, counterfeiter and bad boy. But modern scholars have also theorised that, based on writings like Edward II, this Elizabethan innovator was gay. Marlowe's murky death at 29 in a brawl has been mythologised as much as 2Pac's.

Marlowe's Edward II centres on the titular king's close relationship with his "favourite", Piers Gaveston — and how this imperils his reign. Derek Jarman explored the tragedy's latent homoeroticism in 1991's film. Yet Anthony Weigh's take is even more radical. He has rewritten Edward II — shedding Marlowe's verse (ironically muting him) and streamlining the narrative.

The trouble with exporting a Renaissance-history play into the present day is that such recontexualisation can warp its internal logic. Fortunately, Weigh's queer refocussing is largely credible.

Succeeding his conservative father to the throne, Edward (Johnny Carr), is a thrill-seeking narcissist who loves Piers (Paul Ashcroft) all-consumingly. However, 'Ned's' people resent the indulged commoner's increasing power. Directed by Matthew Lutton, this Edward II is visceral with nudity, passionate exchanges and creeping violence. As Edward's wife Queen "Sib" Isabella, Belinda McClory is pragmatically steely, while Julian Mineo (from the ABC's The Slap) perkily plays the boy heir — a serious archer, too. And, with a massive set resembling a hipster warehouse-pad full of replica pharaonic museum treasures, dramatic visuals and pumping techno, Edward II is spectacular.