It always seemed likely that Samuel West - a thoughtful and introspective actor of great technical skill - would make a first-class Hamlet. The current production on Stratford's main stage finds those expectations fulfilled, writes Chris Gray.

But it will be a source of displeasure for some that the former Oxford student's account of the stage's most challenging tragic role should be framed by so much directorial gimmickry.

To modern dress there can be no objection - except that with it must come modern weapons. Thus we find the ghost of Hamlet's slaughtered father (Christopher Good) ludicrously strafed with machine gun fire as he paces the battlements at Elsinor. For 'paces' read 'races' - such is the ground to cover, for him and others, on this season's vast new grey-walled stage thrusting out over the first rows of the stalls.

We also see Hamlet putting his own pistol to his head as he contemplates suicide as an end to his "sea of troubles". The gun is later used to shoot dead Alan David's unpleasantly officious Polonius, as he hides behind the arras during our hero's chilling confrontation with his mother Gertrude (Marty Cruickshank) who, if not an accomplice in the murder of her husband, has certainly been indecently quick in marrying his brother Claudius (Larry Lamb) who slew and usurped him. A pity, perhaps, that director Steven Pimlott felt unable to cut Gertrude's later reference to Hamlet's having whipped out his rapier - and thereby reduce the play's four-hour running time.

Not, I hasten to add, that time passes slowly. Besides the always-fascinating metaphysical musings of Hamlet, the production has much to commend it. The presentation of Claudius's court as a grey-suited chorus of clapping yes-men and women - shades of New Labour and corporate America - is a conspicuous success. So too is Hamlet's projection of close-ups of Gertrude and Claudius on to enormous screens during the Players' re-enactment of the regicide, the better to study their guilty expressions.

And if Kerry Condon is tryingly waif-like (and puzzlingly Irish) as Ophelia, and Wayne Cater and Sean Hannaway are little more than comic cut-outs as Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, then there are a number of fine performances to compensate.

They include that of Ben Meyjes - an impressive new talent seen recently in Oxford in Another Country - as Laertes. His sword fight with Hamlet (devised by Malcolm Ranson) is one of the best I have seen. Full marks, too, to John Dougall for his sympathetic Horatio, Alan David (again) and Conor Moloney for their droll pair of Gravediggers, and Robert Jezek for his beautifully spoken Player King.

For performance times and tickets telephone the box office on 01789 403403 or visit the RSC website www.rsc.org.uk