History gave us the myth, Freud gave us the complex and dramatists from ancient Sophocles to modern Steven Berkoff gave us the plays.

This is an absolutely gripping production, played with huge skill and gusto by the whole cast.

Prepare to be stunned.

It plays for 105 minutes with no interval and, although challenging, Berkoff’s language is accessible and highly-lyrical.

The story unfolds largely through retelling of events, frozen tableux and mimed, slow-motion action.

The epic story is well-known: Because of a prophecy foretelling that he would he would kill his father and marry his mother, the royal infant Oedipus was hobbled and supposedly left as carrion in the mountains.

In defying this fate he becomes a man who will witness the destruction of all he loves and believes in.

The static set is like a surreal Magritte landscape.

Perpective lines radiate from a central doorway to a long, black bench representing the crossroads upon which Oedipus unknowingly met and murdered his natural father Laius, simultaneously becoming king and cursing the country with plague and infertility.

Traditional Greek music composed by John Chambers becomes increasingly haunting and discordant as things fall apart.

As the play begins, an ensemble cast of eight, representing both advisers and commoners, partake of invisible feasts and demand that Oedipus as their suave king and "master of the universe" secures the ruined State.

Oedipus is a vain man who unwittingly invokes further curses on himself if he fails to avenge his predecessor.

He calls upon his brother-in-law Creon (played like a Greek Godfather by Vincenzo Nicoli), to find the murderer of Laius at all costs.

When two old shepherds are brought together and disclose his origins, Oedipus suspects Creon of conspiracy with the seer Tiresius rather than accept the truth.

Simon Merrells plays the prideful and doomed ruler with seamless strength and passion.

Believing himself to be master of his own fate, he brokenly comes to ask: "Do I shape the world or does the world shape me? Gods laughing like children tormenting flies."

Oedipus’ dignified wife Jocasta (played by Louise Jameson) is the voice of reason set to gentle music.

Initially, she attempts to assure him that there is no art of prophecy, and chillingly wishes to "look after her troubled boy" but subsequent revelations become unbearable.

Having lost Oedipus twice – first as her child and then as her husband – she commits suicide with extraordinary grace.

An echoing crescendo of horror from the chorus gives voice to broken hearts.

The stage is erotically charged as Oedipus caressingly puts his hand to her breast to take her brooch-pin; crying "Blind for so long with open eyes I tear them out."

His final act of self-mutilation is more metaphorical than dramatically excessive.

The worst of his fate is to never to see his children again, demanding his own exile.

As Creon announces "The gods have thrust your face into your own muck!" the once-adored Oedipus is cast out as a tragic abomination.

The performance is a Playhouse tour-de-force.

It runs until March 12.