Miss Julie, Theatre by the Lake, Keswick

CLASS divide, battle of the sexes and evolution of mankind are big issues that are brought together in the passionate and cruel play Miss Julie - set in Sweden in 1888 yet as relevant today as ever, writes KAREN MORLEY-CHESWORTH

Howard Brenton’s new adaptation of August Strinberg’s Miss Julie pulls no punches. It focuses on the upstairs, downstairs relationship, which causes the upper-class Miss Julie played brilliantly with haughty, yet raw passion by Charlotte Hamblin, to descend into madness.

Her weakness for valet Jean highlights the powerlessness of women in a male dominated system. Despite her wealth, education and standing, the consequences of their shared actions have a disproportionate negative impact on her life and mental health than on that of the lower classed male, with no financial or ancestral benefits.

Jean, played by James Sheldon, is as determined to break through the class barriers. He captures that self-determination and cruelty beautifully.

Caught in the crossfire is the hard working, respectable cook and Jean’s fiancée Kristin, played with genteel honesty by Izabella Urbanowicz. Her wordless motions preparing, cleaning, serving food on a loop captures the monotonous life, in which she has little time to think too deeply about love.

Kristin looks down upon Miss Julie over her inappropriate behaviour for her status, while Miss Julie looks down upon Kristin as a servant, not a woman or person of feelings. They are both held, snared in a position to which they cannot escape.

Hamblin changes before your eyes from the self-confident mistress Miss Julie into the mad woman she fears from her childhood. This is a stunning, and frightening performance.

This is no romantic image of life in the big house. This is a gritty, passionate and bloody battle of the sexes, in which each are using the other under a veneer of love, which soon begins to crack.

Brenton has done an excellent job of writing this new adaptation, and the trio of Urbanowicz, Sheldon and Hamblin deliver it with guts, the deepest emotions and mesmerising performance.

Miss Julie runs in the Studio, Theatre by the Lake until November 3.