Sheffield Theatre’s production of this gothic tale features a stunning piece of set design by Christopher Oram.

What looks like an old giant drum, pierced and fractured with light, opens dramatically to the rising pulse of throbbing unearthly music, to reveal a grotesque garden.

Giant tropical plants twist and climb over the walls resembling internal organs rather than sweet smelling blossoms. I expected them to drip blood not nectar! This was Sebastian’s garden before he died.

"Mother Love" from Diana Rigg

Diana Rigg as the gruesome Mrs Venable

Bafta winner Diana Rigg delivered her lines with a deep rasping southern drawl, walked with a pronounced stoop and made my blood run cold as she played the fantastically wealthy and obsessive mother of the dead poet Sebastian.

Out for revenge, she plans to reward poor Dr Cukrowicz (Mark Bazeley) with funding - but only if he agrees to lobotomise young Catharine (Victoria Hamilton), who witnessed the gruesome death of Sebastian while on holiday.

Diana Rigg dominates the early part of the play. As the manipulative and scheming Mrs Venable, she is a loathsome dominant matriach. Her love for her dead son is unnatural.

She tells the doctor that he was "chaste" and at length explains not chased, but chaste - pure and virginal. Later these words take on huge significance when we hear the true circumstances of his death.

She also describes in gory detail how she and Sebastian witnessed the death of baby turtles on the Galapagos Islands. How ravenous great black birds swooped and dived and ripped the flesh of these vulnerable little creatures...vicious birds preying on sweet tasting flesh...

"The girl’s story could be true......."

Victoria Hamilton as Catharine

Victoria Hamilton gave a fantastically haunting performance as the disturbed Catharine.

Fragile and vulnerable looking, she agrees to a truth serum administered by the sympathetic doctor, and emotionally reveals what traumatic secret she witnessed.

Sebastian was a predatory homosexual who liked a bit of rough! He had a taste for young male bodies, and with echoes of the violent death of the Galapagos turtles he is chased by boys and his gaping mouth is stuffed with dripping red flesh...his own flesh.

Williams gives his actors fantastic dialogue, and Catharine’s lines bristle with savage repetitions and revulsion.

His writings reveal his own inner demons while expressing his feelings about mental illness, sexual depravity and inter-family relationships.

I felt rather shaken as the play ended with the set closing up again like a giant Venus fly trap encasing the characters inside.

The packed audience needed a moment to recover, then applauded loudly their appreciation for the whole cast whose performances were mesmerising.

Each and every detail of this production screams class, and the cast deserve frozen daiquiris all round.