The stage of the Theatre Royal becomes a cold interrogation room in Ronald Harwood's tense and emotional play Taking Sides, the film of which has just opened across the country.

We are in a wintry Berlin just after the end of the Second World War and Wilhelm Furtwangler, legendary conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra during the Nazi years, is being questioned about his connections with the Nazi regime.

For American Army Major Steve Arnold any question of innocence does not exist. As far as he is concerned, the musician, Hitler's favourite conductor, was a big fish in the regime who played at party rallies and Hitler's birthday bashes.

Arnold is out to nail this man and has no qualms about his bullying tactics.

He would ignore any evidence in the musician's favour - his help to Jewish musicians, the fact he never joined the party and his insistence on keeping art and politics separate - because for Arnold, who has seen the horrors of Belsen concentration camp, Furtwangler is doomed.

In a cast of six, this is essentially a two-hander for Neil Pearson, who plays the American major, and Julian Glover, the towering maestro.

Pearson's American accent comes as a shock but it is effectively done. And from what begins as a firm conviction that he is right, emerges as a portrait of a bully and a zealot, not far removed from the Nazis he is out to prosecute.

Pearson is never less than mesmerising no matter how much you begin to loathe the character he portrays.

Equally riveting is Glover's portrait of the conductor. Tall, sombre and white-haired, the man comes across as proud, if not arrogant, and starts off confidently in his innocence.

But under the bullying, he starts to dissemble, plead, beg, demur, and finally breaks down in tears as he admits he should have left the country when Hitler came to power.

Taking Sides is a triumph from start to finish. The dialogue is powerful and just what you might expect from the writer who won an Oscar for his screenplay to Roman Polanski's The Pianist.

For tickets, call 01273 328488.