Though stuff at college theatres can often be a little bit ‘school play’, I have to say the underlying premise of this production is actually quite inspired.

Set in Britain in the early 1980s, the play transports the turbulent world of antique Rome to an imagined coup in Margaret Thatcher’s first cabinet; with Maggie herself taking the role of Caesar. This works brilliantly. The stage is draped with Union Jacks and banners with that old Tory logo of the flaming torch printed on them - you remember that logo? From when the Tories had a spine but no conscious. God, that sounds like bizarro world now, doesn’t it?

Jenny Harris made a pretty good job of playing Caesar/Thatcher. She certainly looked the part; her hair and costume were perfect to the finest detail. Richard Benwell’s Mark Anthony was also noteworthy; his performance under the cameras of the Conservative Party Conference at the beginning of the second half was impassioned and incendiary and well - quite excellent. Top of the tree, however, was probably Guy Francis’s Brutus. Perfectly pitched, Francis’s performance twinned the murderous Roman senator with a sort of Portillo-esque smarm. Though the cocaine sniffing was a bit much, he was particularly strong at conveying that sort of self-serving, Gecko-like ambition.

Sadly, that’s where the plaudits end.

The rest of the cast were pretty uneven. For example I wasn’t totally sold on Ben Woodford’s Cassius. Gesture-heavy and sort of creepy, Woodford played Cassius a bit like someone from The League of Gentlemen. What’s more, some young chap, who played a variety of different servanty/messengery type parts, was so nervous he looked like he was going to burst into tears every time he came onto the stage.

Another problem was the scene changes, which were far too sluggish – I don’t care how good the music was which was used to cover them. A rather good deal of clumsy blocking and those hilariously tiny little daggers the cabinet had often made the highly dramatic scenes look a bit silly.

Still, some truly fantastic ideas that could possibly have flourished in better surroundings.