A MAN may 'smile and smile and be a villain' says Hamlet, and this near-contemporary play throws up a grinning tyrant who ranks alongside the great monsters of literature.
Cold, calculating and utterly ruthless, the Roman soldier-politician Titus Flaminius has echoes of Shakespeare's Iago and Don John and fans of Les Misrables would find a parallel with Inspector Javert in his obsessive pursuit of the popular Asian king Antiochus.
This 1631 play by Philip Massinger is a splendid addition to the RSC's Gunpowder Season. Like its companion play, Thomas More, it offers yet more evidence that history moves only in cycles and that cynical political motives will always outsway humanitarian considerations.
It also offers William Houston in a superbly controlled and chilling portrayal of Titus.
The play runs in repertory until November. Box office 0870 609 1110. Review by STEVE EVANS
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