MAD, bad and dangerous to know.

Melting Pot theatre company will determine whether that famous assessment of Lord Byron was really true when it performs Howard Brenton’s Bloody Poetry in Worcester this month.

The professional company based in Worcester, has a reputation for staging absorbing works – last year’s raw production of Macbeth is case in point – and is now preparing to stage Brenton’s factional drama about Percy Bysshe Shelley and George Byron at Worcester Arts Workshop.

Described as a witty, funny, sexy and moving play, Bloody Poetry presents romantic poets Shelley and Byron as unconventional celebrities who advocate atheism and free love.

The play finds idealist Shelley and hard-drinking Byron in exile in Italy, joined by Mary Shelley and Claire Clairemont.

It is a ménage a quatre whose outrageous exploits shocked staid, middle class England but ultimately led to tragedy.

Melting Pot’s Amanda Bonnick will direct the performance.

“This show is a fabulous mix of glorious word-play and intense action, all served up with boys in breeches and girls in muslin dresses,” she said.

“It’s very funny and dramatic – exactly the kind of show Melting Pot loves to perform.”

Written in 1984, Bloody Poetry was inspired by Richard Holmes’ biography of Byron and explores the troubled last days of his life. It followed Brenton’s best known play, The Romans in Britain, which was first staged at the National Theatre in 1980 and drew parallels between the Roman invasion of Britain and the British military presence in Northern Ireland.

Bloody Poetry runs from Tuesday, October 28, to Saturday, November 1.

Tickets, priced £9.50, are available in advance on 01905 611427 and on the door.