The Cane
Royal Court Theatre, London

INSPIRED in its subject matter and its stylised symbolism, Mark Ravenhill’s new play is clever and insightful, exhibiting a highly refreshing artistic freedom in a world dominated by the cliches of mainstream media.

Directed with supreme assurance by Vicky Featherstone, The Cane centres on teacher Edward, who’s about to retire after 45 years in the same school. Expecting a celebratory send-off and multiple expressions of gratitude, instead he finds himself under siege from a terrifying mob of enraged children who hurl bricks through his window and scream abuse in undulating waves of intensity.

Their anger, we understand, is provoked by Edward’s use of corporal punishment back in the day when such things were legal. In the ensuing three-hander, there’s a relentless back-and-forth conversation between Edward’s wife Maureen and their estranged daughter Anna, making a surprise and deeply uncomfortable visit, and Edward himself.

The interactions are played out in the confines of Chloe Lamford’s ingenious set — a ghastly, rotting house with a trapdoor leading to a dark and murky loft. It has the power and presence almost of a fourth and more sinister character — one that tells an uncompromising truth, while the characters themselves flounder.

Their blinkered vision, simmering guilt and profoundly partisan perceptions belie their semblance of rationality and the history of bullying and violence that they do not control constantly emerges. We see their isolation, even if they do not.

It’s a spectacular cast. As an ageing teacher and diminished man, Alun Armstrong superbly combines a mildness of nature with a transforming anger and an inexplicable terror of climbing a ladder into the lurking darkness of the loft.

Nicola Walker, as the apparently calming voice of the mature and professional Anna, spouts current educational jargon as if it is a holy truth while suggesting wells of unhinged behaviour below the surface and Maggie Steed as Maureen carries herself like a woman who has been bullied to the point of oblivion.

A daring and provocative play, it’s joyless and at times if you stop to think, unbelievable — would the rioting children really get away with this? But The Cane is a symbol of the way in which the zeitgeist can change within one lifetime and how what is acceptable to one generation is anathema to another.

A clever exposure of the power of received opinion, it’s beautifully written.

Runs until January 26, box office: royalcourttheatre.com.