On the dust jacket of the first edition, Truman Capote described Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird as a novel ‘so likeable’. And, whatever he meant by that, he was right. It’s a book seemingly universally admired, and not just admired but, that most rare thing in literature, loved too and loved genuinely. And it is this warmth of spirit, this likeability, which comes across so readily in Timothy Sheader heartening production.

The action begins with the cast dotted among the audience, each jumping onto their seat to read a few lines from the book’s opening chapter. Such choric reading happens throughout the play to advance the plot and, in which cases, the cast read from their own well-thumbed editions in their own natural accents. Though it arguably dulls some of Scout Finch’s cock-a-hoop idioms to have them bulldozed with an English or Scottish accent, it succeeds in making the book personal. It is a neat trick. It says: this story did not happen to us; but it is ours nevertheless – we have acquired it somehow with our ill-fitting speech and our proud smiles and our twinkling eyes.

To Kill a Mockingbird takes place in the town of Maycomb, Alabama, sometime in the Great Depression. Told through the understanding of the 8-year-old Scout Finch, the story focuses on her father, Atticus, a widower and a lawyer of enormous courage and principle, who defends a local black man on the spurious charge of beating and raping a white woman. Through Scout’s piercingly innocent inquiry we see Maycomb’s gangrenous underbelly expose itself as one of darkness and prejudice, but we also see the glimmers of light in those townsfolk who, in their own quiet way, reject the de rigueur racism of their community, and who will become the town’s future.

Designer Jon Bausor has seemingly taken a leaf out of Lars Von Trier’s book, by having the cast draw the Maycomb set onto the concrete stage in chalk – Von Trier’s film Dogville had a similar conceit. I actually thought it worked rather better in this play than it does in Von Trier’s tirelessly maudlin film because, whereas in Dogville it was a device used to show only the duplicity of mankind, in the violence and neglect that goes on behind closed doors, here it captures something far less blunt: it replicates the mnemonic nature of the story as it is told. As Scout the narrator, an unknowable amount of years older than Scout the character, remembers the events of those two summers she conjures before us the town from memory, delineating again the paths, the views and the streets of her childhood. And so it his drawn here, in a relic from the schoolroom, and in a dust that will wash away and be forgotten in the rain.

The cast are uniformly strong, with perhaps the black maid, Calpurnia (Michele Campbell), and the neighbour, Maudie Atkinson (Hattie Ladbury), standing out among the supporting cast. Robert Sean Leonard, dressed in a suitably sweat-soaked linen suit, gives us an incredibly comforting, if unoriginal portrayal of Atticus. He is Atticus the archetype, I suppose, the man you imagine from the book, which is hardly a criticism. On the evening I saw the production the children, Scout, Jem and Dill, were played by Eleanor Worthington-Cox, Callum Henderson, and Sebastian Clifford respectively, and each of them was flawless in their portrayal, bringing wit and charm and that requisite sense of wisdom-beyond-their-years to the characters.

Really the only criticism I can find with Sheader’s production is that – and it feels unfair of me to say so – it is somewhat a victim of its own successes. So fondly is the book treated, so accurately are the scenes recreated, that as a piece of drama it ends up feeling overtly safe. Emotional punches are retained, certainly, but they come to the fore only in a handful of scenes, like in the bedroom where Scout asks Jem what he remembers of their dead mother, or the moment Scout recognises Boo Radley. It is ultimately a production that gives us little in the way of dramatic surprises or conflict. One feels that the lines have all been drawn and the arguments already fought and won. Essentially, it is a narrative that made its mind up years ago and, as such, the production feels less a vital piece of theatre, than a staging of a GCSE set text – which, in fairness, is exactly what it is, and which was testified last night by the coachloads of teenagers sat snaked through the auditorium.

Still, what the stage version of To Kill a Mockingbird lacks in edge it more than makes up for in storytelling, in class, in clarity and in likeability. And if you’re going to stage a book so undeniably likeable, then it would be a sin to tinker with it, lest you kill that thing about it, that unnamed quality, that so sings in the memory.

Edward Theakston braves the summer weather for an entrancing night at Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre

Director Timothy Sheader doesn’t disappoint in this beautiful, thoughtful and playful production of Chistopher Sergel’s tear-jerking adaptation of Harper Lee’s Pulitzer Prize winning novel, To Kill A Mockingbird. The story is set in Maycomb, Alabama during the Depression, and the events unfold through the eyes of eight year old Scout Finch.

Sheader, as with Ragtime last summer, places the emphasis on storytelling, and asks that the audience bring imagination to the production. The actors materialise from the audience, reading from versions of the novel, sharing Scout’s narration. The whole cast, progressively donning period costumes as required, draw a map with chalk onto Jon Bausor’s pitched chalkboard-like stage to show the l town. It is a beautifully simple and yet effective concept; the playfulness highlights the initial childish roguishness of Scout, her brother Jem, and their dreamy summer visitor Dill.

Scout’s lawyer father, Atticus, much to the derision of friends and neighbours builds a strong case to defend Tom Robinson, a young black man accused of violently raping a young white woman. The inevitable corruption of youthful innocence is as much a focus of the play as the themes of racial injustice, prejudice and courage. It is one of the greatest strengths of the piece that this grown-up and complex story is seen through the eyes of children. It clarifies the issues, using a child’s natural sense of right and wrong, until we are questioning, just like them, why on earth the world is treating Tom like they are.

Izzy Lee is the lynchpin of the production, and she plays the loveable tomboy Scout with emotion and sincerity. She is hardly ever offstage and performs with incredible professionalism and commitment. She is perfectly matched by Adam Scotland as Jem, and by the superb Harry Bennett who plays the imaginative Dill charmingly.

Robert Sean Leonard, best known for his role in Fox television series House, plays Atticus with total command and power. He also captures the sense of melancholy that plagues any saint-like character. Leonard doesn’t oversimplify the character, and he doesn’t ever feel like a goody two-shoes. His delivery of the closing address in the courtroom scene holds the audience perfectly, and throughout he nails Atticus’ witty, wise temperament.

A brilliant ensemble vibrantly brings the town’s characters to life. Particularly strong are Michele Austin as housekeeper Calpurnia, Richie Campbell as terrified prisoner Tom, Hattie Ladbury as well-meaning neighbour Miss Maudie and Julie Legrand as a variety of old gossips. Rona Morison is heartbreakingly torn as the supposed victim Mayella in her appearance in court.

This is another fabulous production from a theatrical force to be reckoned with. Take tissues, and perhaps a warm jacket.