WHEN Edmund Kean was at the height of his fame, rich theatre patrons forsook their elevated boxes for a place in the pit, so as to see the great man's eyes up close. Almost 200 years later, as he returns to the stage he once stalked, it's easy to see why.

Kean was the son of a drunk and a street hawker, touted around fairs and markets as a child prodigy, seemingly doomed to forever play the harlequin in cheap farce. He went on to become the greatest actor of his age and the first transatlantic superstar.

The first of a trilogy, The Tragedian tells of Kean's rise to fame, the years of struggling, sometimes starving, often drunk. Years of bitterness, anger and personal tragedy. And for the first time, at Richmond's Georgian Theatre Royal, it is brought to one of the stages where Kean performed.

The intimacy of the venue recreates the experience of an early 19th century theatregoer, as Alastair O'loughlin, as Kean, draws the audience into the play, so close you can see the whites of his eyes.

In a captivating performance, O'loughlin turns Kean from an unlikeable drunk into a tragic figure, bristling with passion and energy as he rails against the injustices he faces and struggles to keep his sanity. Kean's early life story is expertly told, weaving songs, letters and appearances on the stage into the narrative, gradually revealing why revenge came to be his dominant motivation for success, even when still in his 20s.

Few plays provide such an opportunity to be at the birth of modern theatre, in what is an utterly absorbing experience.

* Until tomorrow. Box office: (01748) 825252.

Published: 05/11/2004