During a tour last Thursday of Stratford’s soon-to-open new theatre, the RSC’s artistic director Michael Boyd told us critics of the visual wonders that lay in store for audiences there — and of the “thin gruel” the company was being forced to exist on in this department in the temporary Courtyard Theatre. His words came back to me a couple of hours later during the thrilling new stage adaptation at the Courtyard of Sir Thomas Malory’s Morte d’Arthur in which is offered, inter alia, the sight of Excalibur rising from a mist-shrouded lake, jousting with gaily caparisoned lifesize horses and transportation heavenward of the blessed by an angel whose wings, for once, look sturdy enough for the task. Thin gruel! What can we expect from full-strength creamy porridge?

During the theatre tour, it must be said, there had been some speculation about possible longueurs in store from a production billed to last nearly four hours. In the event, the inventive direction of Gregory Doran — ever reliable as a banisher of boredom — and brilliant work from the well-drilled company of actors produced compelling, compulsively watchable entertainment. Poetry sings out from Mike Poulton’s tidy distillation of Malory’s long and discursive work, our template for the Arthurian legends and all they have to say about notions of chivalry and justice. In this venue, one can’t fail to consider the influence these had on Shakespeare. As portrayed in a captivating performance by Sam Troughton, the young Arthur has much of the charismatic machismo of the newly crowned Henry V, just as the twisted villainous malcontent and usurper to his throne Mordred (Peter Peverley) will surely conjure the presence of Richard Crookback.

True, there are times when all the names become a tad confusing; but the story is familiar enough in outline — from The Sword in the Stone, The Once and Future King, Camelot — for the audience not to get lost. Monty Python and the Holy Grail and Spamalot have both familiarised and poked fun at the tale; their influence is felt in occasional and welcome comic touches here, some possibly not intended as such by their creators.

Fine performances abound, among them those of Forbes Masson as a magical, mischievous Merlin, Dyfan Dwyfor as the fearless seeker of the Grail, Percival, Kirsty Woodward with flaming Pre-Raphaelite coiffure (pictured with Sam Troughton) as the faithless Guinever, and Jonjo O’Neill as that archetype of gallantry, Launcelot, whose strange notions of morality, revealed in his compulsive love for her, precipitate the end to the Golden Age of Camelot and the passing of the broken Arthur.

This unmissable production continues until August 28. 0844 800 1110.