Just because this is set at the time of the Restoration, don’t be fooled into thinking that it’ll be a decorous costume drama stuffed with pretty people in pearls.

It is not the theatrical equivalent of a trip to the cinema for The Young Victoria but a lengthy and grisly Howard Barker offering containing enough four-letter words to make even Ross and Brand blush.

There are some who think highly of Barker and others like me who can’t see what all the fuss used to be about (this piece, considered one of his best, is from 1983).

Victory, like too much of his work, is an exhausting fusillade of words in which an eye-watering number of characters act on motivations that are as random as the movements of a pinball machine. Caring about anyone is nigh-on impossible.

Nonetheless, there’s no doubting the passion of Amelia Nicholson’s production, as she moves her actors swiftly and skilfully from scene to scene, from the debauched court of Charles Stuart to the travails of the widow of one of the most renowned Republicans. Dissent, we understand, is seething throughout the land, from Royalists who feel that Charles wasn’t what they fought for, to those who still uphold the ideals of Cromwell.

Matthew Kelly gives an enjoyably roistering performance as one of the rampaging King’s Men; an enterprising theatre should offer him the role of Falstaff sharpish.

Despite a bewildering character shift, a spirited Geraldine James keeps us watching as her wily widow bows but never breaks, to the general degradation of the times. Even so, and despite the fact that Danny Boyle directed Victory’s Royal Court premiere, enough of Barker and his bite.

Until 4 April (020 7503 1646, www.arcolatheatre.com).