Published: 12 August, 2010
by JOSH LOEB

PRIMAL and base, few stories exert as  immense a pull on our imaginations as those of the Old Testament. 

But with so many compulsively readable thrillers around, why burden yourself with a book where the best tales are bundled together with so much interminable jabbering? 

Praise be to Steven Berkoff, therefore, for punching through the waffle to get at the raw power that has echoed down the centuries, influencing so many writers in ways they are oblivious to. 

An agonised roar kicks off this play, which is made up of four parts, as Adam and Eve flump, flesh uncovered, into the Garden of Eden. 

There follow those other famous double acts David and Goliath, Samson and Delilah and Pharaoh and Moses, with memorable performances along the way. Anthony Barclay looks like he has spent time observing snakes in carrying off the reptilian languor of Eden’s forked-tongued villain and Alex Giannini’s Moses possesses all the calm self-control that one expects from a prophet. Aside from the use of modern vernacular, it is hard to see what basis some critics, and the publicity bumph, have for the claim that Berkoff has given these tales “a 21st-­century twist” in his writing and direction. If he has, it must be very subtle; these seem like fairly straight retellings – and therein lies their charm. But then it was ever thus with Bible stories: they have as many interpretations as there are people.

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