There can't be many theatres where the audience are not only asked to turn off their mobile phones before the performance begins, but also to keep their children and pets in order.

Grittier than The Globe, cheaper and more atmospheric than the West End, The Scoop at More London - now in its sixth year - is an outdoor sunken amphitheatre next to City Hall on the South Bank.

There's no need to book - you just turn up. There's room for 1,000, and often two plays a night.

You get a spectacular historial riverside setting and a barbecue and bar for refreshments. The actors perform whatever the weather. And it's free. There seems to be no catch.

The Scoop has already hosted free film screenings and musical performances this summer, but the drama programme - for which it won the 2006 Peter Brook Award for "up-and-coming theatre" - makes the most innovative use of the space. The season starts tonight with Federico García Lorca's classic Blood Wedding, in a translation by Ted Hughes.

Set under night skies, it follows the journey of two lovers as they try to escape the strictures of their rural community. García Lorca was inspired by a newspaper account of a local woman who abandoned her husband-to-be on their wedding day to escape with her childhood sweetheart.

Taking these few facts as a starting point he explores desire, repression, ritual and a community riven by knife crime. To judge by last year's acclaimed production of Brecht's Caucasian Chalk Circle, we can expect an ambitious and accessible production of a 20thcentury classic - far from an easy choice for such a setting.

From 13 August, Petite Rouge will play in tandem - a lively new family musical version of the Little Red Riding Hood story, set in New Orleans. Joan Cushing's script, based on Mike Artell's best-selling children's book, mixes comedy, songs, puppetry, dance and jazz with Cajun music to tell the story of brave Petite Rouge and her cowardly cat TeJean as they dodge an alligator through the swamps of Louisiana on the way to Grandmère's house.

You get an extraordinary diversity of audience, which ranges from seasoned theatregoers with their wine and picnics to passers-by. The stone seats can get cold, even if the sun is out - so remember to take a cushion.

Blood Wedding opens tonight at 8pm and is in rep until 7 September. Petite Rouge is in rep 13 August-7 September. www.morelondon.com/scoop