Review: THE PIT AND THE PENDULUM, Omnibus Theatre

We see images of Iran from the time of the Shah - cosmopolitan, chic and modern (though it had, to say the least, its problems then too). Then we're catapulted into the present day and we're with a woman, incarcerated, alone and accused of breaching the sumptuary laws of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Creation Theatre's reimagining of Edgar Allen Poe's 19th-century classic is very much a 21st-century affair - and that brings issues that ultimately dilute its visceral impact.

Afsaneh Dehrouyeh paces out the dimensions of her cell, avoids toppling into the pit but gives as good as she gets, arguing with the voice of Poe (Nicholas Osmond), refusing to accept the state of victimhood, defiance her weapon of choice.

We learn of her crime - ostensibly releasing her hair and using her hijab as a rallying flag, but, of course, her crime is actually her assertion of womanhood. We know she stands for many - very many.

Christopher York's adaptation is an immersive multimedia experience: we're wearing headphones, and there's Eva Auster's video and montage illuminating the dark with Matt Eaton's sound design at least as prominent as the visuals in the sensory assault.

The issue with this approach is that the appalling dread that lies at the heart of Poe's Torquemada tale never really arrives. Dehrouyeh is too cocky, too dismissive of her torture, too powerful to be a credibly powerless person - while that all works from the perspective of placing a 21st-century woman into Poe's purgatory, the overwhelming fear never transmits itself to us.

Even the rats bubbling up from the black abyss, squeaking and crawling, are dismissed as another challenge to be met and overcome like a delayed Tube train on the way home.

Ultimately, an immersive experience of Edgar Allen Poe should leave you desperate to escape the space, anxiety speeding up breathing, skin crawling - that's Poe's unique power, even today. This production leaves you proud of the human spirit's capacity to resist - an admirable sentiment, but not really Poe's.

The Pit and the Pendulum continues at the Omnibus Theatre until 24 November.

Photo Richard Budd

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