Most newspapers run a star system for arts reviews, asking critics to allocate up to five asterisks for each production. This system is doubly unpopular with journalists due to the suspicion that the visual ranking offers busy readers an alternative to the article and because, especially in theatre, the majority of productions deserve around 2.5 to three stars for the acting, writing or direction or some combination of the three.Amid so much decent mediocrity, then, it is a relief to have the survival of critical faculties confirmed by the experience of seeing in the same week a clear five-star show – the transfer to the Wyndham’s Theatre in London’s West End of the Young Vic revival of A View from the Bridge, over which I enthused in this column last year – and th