ANYA Reiss’s new version of Frank Wedekind’s Spring Awakening is given its premiere in Leeds from tomorrow at the start of a three-year partnership between the West Yorkshire Playhouse and Headlong.

Whereas the Broadway musical revision of Wedekind’s play married the songs of the 21st century to the original German setting of 1906, Reiss has moved the story forward to the present day.

In a society where we are bombarded by overt messages and images, Reiss’s startling adaptation evokes the sexual precocity and confused raw tension of teenage life today.

“I quite liked the music but it felt like the story was repressed into a rock’n’roll musical world when in fact it applies naturally to today,” says Anya, winner of the Evening Standard and Critics’ Circle Awards for Most Promising Playwright for her first play, Spur Of The Moment.

“The characters didn’t need updating but I’ve updated the setting to now, which is a strength of a good play: it can feel like a new play.”

When first performed in Germany in 1906, Spring Awakening was notorious for causing riots on account of its provocative content of adolescent sexuality, suicide, abortion and rape. Headlong’s new version filters the restless urgency and erotic energy of the original and questions how young people are still shaped for their future by a generation that doesn’t understand them.

“I worked from literal translations but also used Edward Bond’s translation too and a couple of others and then went back to the original pidgin translation to check I hadn’t screwed it up,” says Anya. “In making it modern, it feels like you’re freeing the story from just being about German society.

“Wedekind didn’t set out to write what would become an historical piece; he wanted to write a really shocking play about what was happening to young people. I thought I was going to have to make it more shocking for now but in fact it’s still pretty shocking anyway.”

• West Yorkshire Playhouse and Headlong presents Spring Awakening, West Yorkshire Playhouse, Leeds, tomorrow until March 22 at 7.45pm plus 2pm, Thursdays, and 2.30pm, Saturdays. Box office: 0113 213 7700.