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News: 4 National Theatre shows to appear on Amazon Prime Video

Amazon has partnered with the National Theatre to stream four high-profile live-recorded stage shows, including Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s Fleabag.

The shows, which include Benedict Cumberbatch and Jonny Lee Miller in 2011’s Frankenstein, will be made available to Amazon’s Prime Video customers in the UK and Ireland from 11 June.

The two other performances are Cumberbatch as Hamlet, filmed at the Barbican in 2015, and Ian McKellen on Stage, a solo show the Lord of the Rings actor toured in 2019 to mark his 80th birthday.

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News: National Theatre at Home continues with dual Frankensteins and more

National Theatre at Home continues its home programming with both versions of Frankenstein with Benedict Cumberbatch and Jonny Lee Miller and Antony and Cleopatra with Ralph Fiennes and Sophie Okonedo, plus there’s a National Theatre at Home Quiz 

Following on from the success of its opening set of transmissions – One Man, Two Guvnors was viewed over 2.5 million times in the week it was available – the National Theatre has announced the next two productions it will be airing as part of National Theatre at Home. 2011’s Frankenstein with Benedict Cumberbatch and Jonny Lee Miller sharing its two main roles and 2018’s Antony and Cleopatra, starring Ralph Fiennes and Sophie Okonedo.

Both productions will be free to stream, premiering at 7.00PM BST and then available on demand for seven days. Further productions to be streamed as part of National Theatre at Home will be announced soon.

Today also sees the launch of the National Theatre at Home Quiz, to be played from home featuring familiar faces from the world of stage and screen as the quizmasters. Each quiz will include rounds of five questions on a wide variety of topics.

On the final Monday of each month people will be able join the virtual quiz directly from their homes via the NT’s YouTube channel and Facebook page live at 7pm. The first quiz will be on Monday 27 April with quizmasters Dame Helen Mirren, Sir Lenny Henry, Lesley Manville, and Sir Ian McKellen asking questions on topics including history, sport, nature, and of course, the National Theatre (bagsy team Manville).  

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Book review: The Half – Simon Annand

The Half – Photographs of Actors Preparing for the Stage by Simon Annand

Just a quickie for this book as The Half – Photographs of Actors Preparing for the Stage by Simon Annand was released in 2008. But with an imminent new exhibition of these photos and a bargainous copy of the book popping up on Ebay, I thought I’d take the plunge.

And I’m glad I did as it is a proper work of art in its own right. Annand has been photographing actors for over 25 years and as such, has a veritable treasure trove of shots to share with us, resulting from the trusting relationships he has built up with so many, from the new kids on the block to veritable dames. Continue reading “Book review: The Half – Simon Annand”

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Hallowe’en DVD Review: Dracula 2000 (2000)

“You know not the depths of my vengeance”

Oh my days, this is not good. This is not good at all. The only thing that makes Dracula 2000 halfway watchable is looking at Gerard Butler before he discovered fake tan and protein powder as he wafts through the film like an art student version of the titular villain. But even that pleasure soon wears off with this horrendously dated (even in the last 16 years, yes) re-imagining of Bram Stoker’s Dracula.

To a heavily nu-rock soundtrack (where are the likes of Papa Roach and Linkin Park these days?!), director Patrick Lussier aims for (I think) B-movie schlock but just ends up with drivel, which somehow managed to get Christopher Plummer to appear in it as Van Helsing, yes the original one who has prolonged his existence by using leeches to siphon Dracula’s life-enhancing blood. Because he’s kept Dracula’s coffin in a vault, to look after it, forgot to mention that didn’t I. Continue reading “Hallowe’en DVD Review: Dracula 2000 (2000)”

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DVD Review: Mansfield Park (1999)

“Life seems nothing more than a quick succession of busy nothings”

Eek. So having sampled the more recent ITV version of Mansfield Park. I next turned to Patricia Rozema’s 1999 film adaptation and adaptation is surely the right word for it felt like an entirely different story and not in a good way. Again, there’s a distinct modernisation of the heroine into something which was assumedly palatable for test audiences and/or studio bosses but consequently way misses the mark for anything truly Austenesque, Frances O’Connor isn’t exactly bad as Fanny but it never feels like a good fit.

Elsewhere, there’s a scything of some of the key characters, script changes altering others completely. And strangely, given how much of Austen’s novel has to be concertinaed into feature film length, Rozema opts to add in new material – an overworked strand about slavery is heavy-handed in the extreme, the hints of lesbianism (Embeth Davidtz’s Mary Crawford) a desperate ploy for scandal, opium addiction for Lady Bertram scandalously wasting the presence of Lindsay Duncan.  Continue reading “DVD Review: Mansfield Park (1999)”

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DVD Review: Emma (2009)

“He would know me but there’s no reason I would know a farmer”

Of all the versions of Jane Austen’s Emma, I can’t really believe that I will ever see one as well done as this 2009 BBC adaptation by Sandy Welch and directed by Jim O’Hanlon. Everything about it works for me, from the clever casting choices to the subtle redefinition of some characters, the (now) luxurious running time to the production values which mark it as something of a dying breed in terms of BBC period dramas.

I love its inventive prologue contrasting the early lives of Emma, Frank and Jane, how tragedy touched them all but their positions in life meant their journeys took wildly different paths. Romola Garai makes an immensely appealing heroine, her beautiful wide eyes so open and honest yet quickly able to take on a harder glint as her more self-obsessed side takes over, and she works so brilliantly with her cast-mates to give us full-fleshed, believable relationships.

There’s genuine affection with Michael Gambon’s fretful father, a tangible sisterly bond with Jodhi May’s former governess, a vivid friendship with Louise Dylan’s hapless Harriet and that real sense of antipathy that comes from two beautiful girls not quite able to make each other out with the arrival of Laura Pyper’s mysterious Jane Fairfax. And there’s Jonny Lee Miller’s excellent Mr Knightley, a hugely handsomely dashing figure who shares immense chemistry with Garai. Continue reading “DVD Review: Emma (2009)”

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DVD Review: The Canterbury Tales (2)

“I was meant to do the world a service”

Watching the 2003 adaptations of The Canterbury Tales may have gotten off to a shaky start on disc 1 but soon rallied to make the project seem a worthwhile one and so I tackled disc 2 with some gusto. Unfortunately these latter three stories also suffered from the same unevenness and ultimately threw up a big question about the efficacy of the whole thing. In Avie Luthra’s The Sea-Captain’s Tale, the story of a marriage in an Indian community gone sour gains a pungent power as Indira Varma’s manipulative Meena turns to her husband’s business partner when in something of a bind. She would have it that Om Puri’s older Jetender is an oppressive bully and that Nitin Ganatra’s Pushpinder is her only chance of happiness, but it is soon apparent that she will say and do anything to get her bills paid, her urges satisfied and her selfishness sated. It has a film noir-ish tendency which works well and Varma is always eminently watchable.

The Pardoner’s Tale, retooled by Tony Grounds, is much less successful though. An unwieldy tale of three ne’er-do-wells and their conman ways in a town that is reeling from the impact of a potential serial killer as another teenage girl disappears. As parents and friends intensify their search, the men plot ways to scam money for themselves and as a young woman falls into their circle, the two plot strands ostensibly weave closer. But it is clumsily done, the denouement an unsubtle hammer blow and the elements of the story far too disparate – Jonny Lee Miller as the lead character is vaguely interesting, but not enough to save it. Continue reading “DVD Review: The Canterbury Tales (2)”

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2012 Laurence Olivier Awards nominations

Best New Play 
Collaborators by John Hodge – National Theatre Cottesloe
Jumpy by April De Angelis – Jerwood Downstairs, Royal Court
One Man, Two Guvnors by Richard Bean – National Theatre Lyttleton
The Ladykillers by Graham Linehan – Gielgud

Best New Musical
Betty Blue Eyes – Novello
Ghost – Piccadilly
London Road – National Theatre Cottesloe
Matilda – Cambridge
Shrek – Theatre Royal Drury Lane

Best Revival 
Anna Christie – Donmar Warehouse
Flare Path – Haymarket
Much Ado about Nothing – Wyndham’s
Noises Off – Old Vic Continue reading “2012 Laurence Olivier Awards nominations”

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Winners of the 2012 What’s On Stage Awards

BEST ACTOR IN A PLAY
James Corden – One Man, Two Guvnors at the National, Lyttelton & Adelphi (31.7%)
Benedict Cumberbatch – Frankenstein at the National, Olivier (27.2%)
Jude Law – Anna Christie at the Donmar Warehouse (7.0%)
Kevin Spacey – Richard III at the Old Vic (5.8%)
David Tennant – Much Ado About Nothing at Wyndham’s (22.7%)
James Earl Jones – Driving Miss Daisy at Wyndham’s (5.5%)

BEST ACTRESS IN A PLAY
Vanessa Redgrave – Driving Miss Daisy at Wyndham’s (28.3%)
Eve Best – Much Ado About Nothing at Shakespeare’s Globe – (22.8%)
Kristin Scott Thomas – Betrayal at the Comedy – (18.0%)
Ruth Wilson – Anna Christie at the Donmar Warehouse (11.4%)
Samantha Spiro – Chicken Soup with Barley at the Royal Court Downstairs (7.1%)
Tamsin Greig – Jumpy at the Royal Court Downstairs (12.4%)
 Continue reading “Winners of the 2012 What’s On Stage Awards”

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Leading Man of the Year 2011

In lieu of Mr Cowan’s (twice winner of this category) highly unfortunate ineligibility (due to the fact I haven’t seen him onstage this year), I was toying with the idea of renaming this award along the lines of The Elliot Cowan Award for Hotness, (cue bonus pic) 
but thought better of it. In any case, I present to you the winner, and then the 9 runners-up in no particular order of the men (so many of whom called Dominic) who made going to the theatre so much, somewhat less of a trial. This has also regularly been one of the most popular posts I do each year, shame on us all!

Continue reading “Leading Man of the Year 2011”