Josie Rourke’s excellent production of Coriolanus at the Donmar Warehouse transformed one of Shakespeare’s lesser-loved plays into one of my favourites. An unusually minimalist staging of the play, which creates a serious but also refreshingly open, unpretentious atmosphere, is twinned with the use of few props.

Chairs set up along the back of the stage become shields, plinths and general objects to be thrown around in times of distress. However, when used for the characters to sit on when supposedly off-stage, the effect was somewhat questionable. This even led to clumsiness at one point when a scuffle with a senator led to Sicinia accidentally hitting a sitting Volumnia ‘off-stage'.

Graffiti along the back wall, which stands as a symbol for the unrest of the masses, also wittily reminds us of the beginning of the play when an Antium citizen ironically scrubs it off before directing Coriolanus to Aufidius’ house, from where he goes on to betray the Romans. Costumes which fuse modern Chelsea boots and leather-lacing at the tops of trousers provide a subtly modern touch, embodying the ethos behind Rourke’s production.

Despite the simple backdrop, the visual quality of the play is far from bland: a shower scene in which Coriolanus, played by Tom Hiddleston, washes his blood-drenched and muscular body will undoubtedly thrill many members of the audience, although misses an interesting chance to create a more tender side to his character.

Hiddleston gives a high-quality performance as the impressive military man who in his stubborn snobbery fails to grasp the important delicacy of social politics and provides some excruciatingly great comedy in the tense, teeth grating scene before his fall. His unusual but engaging eye-contact with the audience as he physically turns away from the other characters is strangely exciting and a fitting touch for a play in which the audience is constantly made a place of implied authority – part of the rebellious mob, an audience of senators, or the location of Aufidius’ house.

However, it is Deborah Findlay’s blazing performance as Coriolanus’ mother that really drives the play. With her increasingly desperate attempts to control the actions of the other characters, she provides an emotional core through a series of speeches, which become more enthralling than any of the action that actually does take place. Helen Schlesinger's clever portrayal of Sicinius - now the shrewd Sicinia - provides an interesting balance for female characters between the Coriolanus' starkly outspoken mother and his almost completely silent wife.

It is this brilliant cast that really brings out the steeliness of the complexities and tensions within Coriolanus that drives Shakespeare’s tragedy.