Commissioned to commemorate one of the great naval battles against the Ottomans on a vast canvas, Galactia disregards instructions to prettify the carnage — and a clash of culture and state sponsorship inevitably follows. By turns foolishly combative and recklessly brave, Shaw's Galactia is without doubt the equal of Glenda Jackson, who played the part in a memorable BBC radio version in 1984. For one thing, she delivers Barker's dense dialogue (and often monologues) as if she had just thought of its sentiments. She's also well-matched with the Doge, clad in mustard and maroon silk: a comical but not stupid grand panjandrum (think Lord Patten of Barnes and the BBC). Flayed by the contingencies of church and politics, he somehow emerges triumphant in time for a good dinner.

There's one major conceptual flaw however: the character of Galactia. A bare-breasted, sexy woman who doesn't like wars is a creature who flows more readily from the imaginations of leftish male writers in the 1980s than Venice in 1571. Some of the feminist screeds are a lot more like Edna O'Brien in full flow than any of the female artists on whom the heroine might plausibly  be based (excellent programme notes on this, by the way, from the level-headed Richard Cork).

But Barker's play survives his own tendentious flaw because he allows both the state and the artist in this eternally awkward conversation space to have their say — and some fun along the way. For heaven's sake, don't tell him: it is an enjoyable night in the stalls.

I do wish I could have said the same for Strindberg's Mademoiselle Julie at the Barbican. It came with all the promise of Juliette Binoche in the lead role in a French production, but they should have saved the price of the Eurostar tickets. This production was little short of a catastrophe, and not in the Howard Barker sense either.