Stage-to-screen review: Bubble

"Zoom? It'll never catch on."

It's no surprise if one of the most prolific playwrights working today is among the first out of the gates with a new Covid play, nor that James Graham has approached the subject with a sharp political focus but from a highly original direction. Bubble is playing for three performances only at Nottingham Playhouse, with a socially distanced live audience and everyone else able to buy a pass to watch one of the performances on Zoom. Micro-pub owner Ashley (Pearl Mackie) and teacher Morgan (Jessica Raine) are buzzing after having been on a great first date, the first successful one for either of them in a long time. Then lockdown laws are announced and they have a very reckless thought: What if they went into isolation together and found out just how accurate those great first impressions were?

Theatre review: X

A much-anticipated new play from Alistair McDowall, after his sleeper hit Pomona, and following the dark fantasy of that play he goes sci-fi for X, set on a research station on retired planet Pluto. Not that there's much there to research (the Americans get all the interesting missions) and even if there were Ray (Darrell D'Silva) and his team's contracts expired weeks ago - or possibly months, but the clock which keeps the base on Earth time is increasingly unreliable - it might have been much longer than they think. Ray second-in-command Gilda (Jessica Raine) is visibly feeling the strain, prone to regular panic attacks and tears, and snapping at her co-workers Cole (Rudi Dharmalingam) and Clark (James Harkness.) Surprisingly chipper is Mattie (Ria Zmitrowicz,) who rattles around in the ceiling taking care of the life support systems which she refers to as "the girls."

Theatre review: Roots

"Everyone's so bored!" wails Jessica Raine, accurately. In Arnold Wesker's Roots at the Donmar Warehouse, Raine is Beatie, returning for a couple of weeks' visit to her family in Norfolk. We know it's Norfolk because everyone speaks in an accent that sounds vaguely Westcountry via Ireland with the occasional detour to Australia, and whenever actors sound like they're making the accent up as they go along it invariably turns out to be an attempt at Norfolk. And lo, Norwich and Diss get mentioned, so it seems I was right. Beatie now lives in London with her boyfriend Ronnie. Ian thought his name was actually Rani, but I put it down to that accent again, because if she was dating a rogue Time Lady it would probably have been mentioned. Then again, mentioning interesting things would probably go against the spirit of the play.

Theatre review: The Changeling (Young Vic)

It's apparently double-barrelled name week at the theatre for me: Nathan Stewart-Jarrett on Monday, Harry Hadden-Paton last night and a triple dose tonight with Henry Lloyd-Hughes, Kobna Holdbrook-Smith and director Joe Hill-Gibbins - even the anti-heroine of Middleton and Rowley's The Changeling is called Beatrice-Joanna. Contracted by her father (Howard Ward) to marry Alonzo (Duncan Wisbey,) Beatrice-Joanna (Jessica Raine) has her eye on Alsemero (Holdbrook-Smith) instead. Her solution is to charm detested servant De Flores (Daniel Cerqueira) into murdering Alonzo, but she hasn't counted on De Flores being obsessed with her, and demanding a reward she's not prepared to give willingly. Designer Ultz has created an industrial in-the-round set with seating on both levels of the Young Vic's Maria; I initially went in downstairs, but got the feeling parts of the set would block some of the action so went upstairs. From there, looking down on the action from behind netting, the feeling is of being at some kind of secret fight to the death.

The chaotic set is a reflection of Hill-Gibbins' production, which goes for a sense of surreal hysteria. Somewhat tenuously connected to the main plot is a subplot set in a lunatic asylum, where Lloyd-Hughes' Antonio pretends to be a patient so as to get to the asylum-keeper's wife (Charlotte Lucas.) If not so much the story, it's the tone of insanity about the subplot that ties in to the rest of the production, and James Farncombe's lighting is used to good effect in differentiating the play's various worlds.

Jacobethan tragedy can be so OTT as to be funny, and in marked contrast to the recent Southwark Playhouse production (frankly, far from the only way in which this production has the edge) the director has embraced its extremes. Jelly, punch and trifle feature both in the violence, and in the sex during the bed trick that gives the play its title. Although if the chocolate sauce was meant to signify what I thought it was, someone ought to see a doctor. The production's full of ideas, which is good, even if they don't always work - it takes quite a while for the story to take shape, and one very clever visual device is used a couple of scenes after it could have provided a helpful shorthand to what had happened offstage. It's a well-acted production though, and one whose energy and tongue-in-cheek approach to the subject matter makes it memorable.

The Changeling by Thomas Middleton and William Rowley is booking until the 25th of February at the Young Vic's Maria (returns only according to the website, although tonight I could see about a dozen empty seats.)

Running time: 1 hour 45 minutes straight through.