IT’S pretty difficult being young. All those raging emotions: fierce highs, desperate lows, the frantic need to have everything NOW, and everywhere annoying adults who insist on slowing things down and sticking their oar in where it isn’t wanted.

That melting pot of emotions, simmering away in the heat of a Verona summer, is brought startlingly to life in the fresh and frantic production of Headlong Theatre’s Romeo and Juliet currently showing at Salisbury Playhouse.

Daniel Boyd and Catrin Stewart bring a new accessibility to the young lovers – what teenager wouldn’t identify with their desperate need for each other or their railing against authority and expectation?

Romeo’s friends, Benvolio and Mercutio (Danny Kirrane and Tom Mothersdale) are typical lads, wrestling with their emotions and sprinkling the unfolding tragedy with welcome moments of genuine humour.

But it’s time itself that is at the centre of this production.

From the opening moments, when a large digital clock ticks away the seconds at the back of a sparsely set stage, the audience is dragged along with the actors as the star-crossed lovers hurtle inevitably towards their fate.

By clever use of staging techniques, there are several ‘Sliding Doors’ moments, where the audience is offered a taste of what might have been had events unfolded in a slightly different way.

There have been many incarnations of what is arguably Shakespeare’s best known play, and director Robert Icke’s revival stands with the best of them.

With some marvellous performances all round, this clever production will bring Romeo and Juliet alive for a new generation and remind the rest of us with startling clarity exactly what it’s like to be young.

Romeo and Juliet runs until March 3.