Orlando

Fans of Virginia Woolf's gender-bending classic, Orlando, will either be aghast at the liberties The Rabble's very loose reworking takes, or will love their creative and confronting interpretation. In the book, Orlando is an ageless, androgenous and rather charming character. On stage, Woolf's protagonist loses its sense of whimsy and becomes a tragic figure, preoccupied by the performance of gender and the impossibility of achieving a stable or coherent sense of self. A series of impressionistic scenes without an obvious narrative, the play throws Orlando together with a cast of oblique characters, including an amorous Queen Elizabeth I and sneering poet Nicholas Green. The action tales place against a backdrop of literal smoke and mirrors, on a stage which is inches deep in pale, milky water. There's a rich mash-up of cultural references on display, from texts by Gertrude Stein and Sappho to interludes of punk music and some very funny if silly jokes involving sausages and sporrans. Playing Orlando as both a man and a woman, Dana Miltins delivers a fearless performance, and Kate Davis's brilliant set and costumes create a visually suggestive feast. The dialogue is sparse and verging on portentous, but a final monologue offers a transporting moment of calm after the chaos.

Running at The Malthouse Tower Theatre until Saturday 27 October