Bull, Young Vic *****

Mike Bartlett has gone from the grandure of King Charles III to the intimacy of his latest play to come to London. Bull is 55 minutes of pure torture; gut-wrenching and awful in its depiction of bullying in the workplace. As soon as you enter the studio space from the Vic, you recognise that this is a sport rather than a play; you recognise the Bull in Sam Troughton's Thomas; you recognise his tormentors in his two collegues and his boss. The set up is that three workers are waiting for a meeting with their boss in which one of the three will be fired. Bartlett's writing is electrifying, dynamic and graphic in order to show this taunting of Troughton's bull. It gets to the point to, at times, manipulating you into confusing the bully for the victim. James' clearly has good taste in terms of writing, having come straight from Bartlett's play about the fall of the monarchy to this masterpiece. He, along with Eleanor Matsuura are device, slippery and superb as the 'toreadors' and Neil Stuke goes from being the clerk in Silk to the boss who joins in with the tormentation of the star of this piece Sam Troughton. There was no lost voice for him in this where he shows an extraordinary range, especially in the last 10 minutes which was almost physically painful to witness. Soutra Gilmour's design is magnificent and simple to give the audience the feeling of witnessing a bull- fight, creating the perfect atmosphere for the tension which Clare Lizzimore directs. Why this has not created more of a fuss stumps me as it is spectacular and secures Mike Bartlett to be, in my opinion, as Britain's greatest living playwright.