THE Ustinov Studio at the Theatre Royal in Bath has a new artistic director and, by golly, does it show in Phaedra and Minotaur on until Tuesday, August 23.

Deborah Warner has joined the TRB after working with leading theatre companies and performers worldwide and having held a series of senior positions, including Resident Director of the Royal Shakespeare Company, Associate Director of the National Theatre and Associate Director of The Barbican.

She is joined by Richard Hetherington, who is Head of Music at the Royal Opera House in London, and who will be her Director of Music at the Ustinov.

Already, this formidable artistic pairing is paying dividends, as a packed house on Thursday watched performances of Benjamin Britten’s opera Phaedra, and the Minotaur choreographed by Kim Brandstrup, both based on the ancient Greek myth of Phaedra, the Minotaur (who is half beast/half man), Theseus and Hippolytus.

Leading mezzo-soprano Christine Rice reprises her Olivier Award-nominated performance in Phaedra which was a hit at the Royal Opera House in 2020.

She gave an outstanding and intensely dramatic performance in the title role, accompanied by Richard Hetherington on piano and dancers Jonathan Goddard and Tommy Franzen.

The two dancers linked up for the second piece, Minotaur, after the interval, with local dancer Laurel Dalley Smith, a former Dorothy Coleborn School of Dance pupil, returning to her hometown, having first performed on the Theatre Royal main stage at the age of nine.

Minotaur was breathtakingly and beautifully danced by all three, with a superb display of dancing and climbing by Tommy Franzen which made full use of the auditorium walls and staging. He is apparently an avid rock climber in his spare time and it showed in a truly athletic and electric performance.

The three dancers and Miss Rice were deservedly given an ecstatic and prolonged round of applause by the packed auditorium at the end of their performances.

Ms Warner is proposing to develop a new model for the Ustinov Studio programme, including revivals of major classics, alongside the development of new plays and theatre work interpreted in the broadest sense.

So, expect to see adaptations of existing novels, staging of poems, presentation of new theatre artists and their work.

In addition, there will be a major commitment to a music theatre programme, fully staged song cycles and an annual staging of an opera each year.

On this showing, with Phaedra and the Minotaur, she’s already off to a flying start. I look forward to seeing what comes next.