A Tale of Two Cities, King's Head, review What do you think is the best-selling novel of all time? According to Adam Spreadbury-Maher, the artistic director of the King's Head Theatre, the prize goes to Charles Dickens's A Tale of Two Cities, with sales of more than 200 million copies since its publication in 1859. It is hard to believe - the novel is not one of Dickens's cheerier oeuvres - but film adaptations starring Ronald Colman and Dirk Bogarde as the romantic hero, Sydney Carton, must have helped sales. And so might a 1935 stage adaptation by the young Terence Rattigan, written in collaboration with John Gielgud who was to play Carton, had it not been cancelled just as rehearsals were about to begin. Wounded by the casual brutality with which Gielgud jettisoned his drama, Rattigan abandoned it. Spreadbury-Maher learned of the play's existence during Rattigan's centenary celebrations in 2011 and began planning its theatrical premiere, almost 80 years after it was written. The current production is a much abbreviated account of Gielgud and Rattigan's ambitious original vision - the text shortened by a third and the cast of 40 reduced to a versatile eight who double, triple and even sextuple their roles, executing some remarkably nimble footwork to represent the horrors of the French Revolution in the diminutive space of the King's Head. Christopher Hone's set is a stark white platform; the only furniture the cobbler's stool at which Dr Manette (John Hodgkinson) worked during his long years of imprisonment in the Bastille. As versatile as the cast, the stool doubles as the counter of Mme Defarge's wine shop, judge's bench and sideboard in the Manette family home. Despite the odd moment of narrative confusion, Spreadbury-Maher's production works well on the whole, thanks to energetic performances by his ensemble, who do their best to give some heft to DIckens's rather two-dimensional characters. Jennie Gruner plays Lucie Manette with an appealing steely sweetness. Shelley Lang is alarmingly vengeful as Mme Defarge and Stewart Agnew, making his professional debut as Sydney Carton, brings a powerful whiff of Russell Brand to the dissipated hero - his rock god blend of swagger and pathos underlined by a soundtrack of Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix and Amy Winehouse (all of whom, like Carton, died at the age of 27). Special mention should go to Jonathan Lipman's imaginative costume design, which brings a sharp stylishness to this haiku version of Rattigan's drama. Tickets: 020 7478 0160; kingsheadtheatre.com