THE national press swooped on York Theatre Royal on Wednesday – The Times, the Guardian, the Tablet Catholic newspaper – drawn to a rare adaptation of Graham Greene's 1938 murder thriller Brighton Rock.

Bryony Lavery, who right now has plays opening in New York and London as well as York, is the high-profile name that has steered Greene's work from page to stage, while Northern Irish composer Hannah Peel, a favourite of BBC 6Music, has provided the striking electronic, percussive and choral score.

Of more parochial interest, Brighton Rock is Pilot Theatre artistic director Esther Richardson's first production since she took over at the Theatre Royal's resident company. It has been a hugely ambitious undertaking, involving four weeks of rehearsals rather than the usual three, coupled with a technically demanding set, and the opening had to be put back from last Friday to Saturday.

One scene had been removed already by press night and with the clock ticking towards a 10.30pm finish, there is a case for taking a Pinkie knife to such a visceral, intense, cut-throat piece of theatre to apply further cuts. This might well be a regular cry from this reviewer's seat, but shorter would be stronger, when, like in Romeo And Juliet, there are inexorable, destructive forces at work that mean the finale cannot be prevented.

In Greene's Brighton world of oppressive Catholicism, repressed homosexuality, lowlifes, love and hate, stymied life and early death, Jacob James Beswick's Pinkie is 17, a milk-toothed, hate-filled mob leader taking on the adult world; Sarah Middleton's Rose is 16, a waitress with sado-masochistic proclivities and a taste for danger. Will today's teens connect with them or recoil from them?

In Richardson's programme notes, she writes of Pilot seeking to "make grown-up work for younger audiences and to grapple with the drama, difficulty, joy and complexity of becoming an adult". This points to Brighton Rock being ideal Pilot material, an even more messed-up Romeo And Juliet with a teenage marriage and rival gangs, but it is not as universal nor as pliable.

York Press:

Gloria Onitiri as Ida in Brighton Rock. Picture: Karl Andre Photography

Richardson's production is not specifically set in the 1930s; it could be the Fifties too, with a crackly record player opening and closing the performance.

Hannah Peel, on her keyboard, and James Field, on percussion, are on the stage throughout, tucked away like Sally Cookson's musicians in the National Theatre's Jane Eyre, or in a Kneehigh show.

Sara Perks's set is on two levels, with pier lights and stairways on wheels that can be pulled out for choreographed scenes of knife slashings and Pinkie and Rose's awkward consummation of their rash marriage. Peaky Blinders meets West Side Story in Jennifer Jackson's movement direction and Philip D'Orleans fight direction, while Aideen Malone's lighting is outstanding, often dark, but with a blue light for a police interview and a chandelier for a night's revels.

The second half wanes, when it needs to intensify, but in a production of good moments and lulls, there are three plus points. Above all, Lavery's decision to make the guardian-angel investigative figure of Ida - the one force for good - more prominent is rewarded with a brilliant performance by Gloria Onitiri (who has the best songs too).

Likewise, the ensemble's dark angels, who move scenery, adopt roles, vanish from view, are a successful innovation, and Pinkie silently mouthing the words of the Lord's Prayer at the finale, as he seeks redemption, is a haunting image on which to finish.

Brighton Rock, Pilot Theatre/York Theatre Royal, at York Theatre Royal, until March 3, then on tour, including Hull Truck Theatre, March 20 to 24. Box office: York, 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk; Hull, 01482 323638 or at hulltruck.co.uk