Stage-to-screen review: The Madness of George III

National Theatre At Home, which uses recordings made during the NT Live cinema screenings that have become very popular internationally in the last ten years, has been at the forefront of online theatre in lockdown, with whole shows being made available on YouTube for one week only. I only haven't mentioned them on this blog yet because, being predominantly shows from the NT itself, I'd already seen them live and reviewed them at the time*. In recent weeks the NT has expanded the project's horizons though, offering shows from other venues, and with it the opportunity to share in the fundraising drive. This week this means a trip to Nottingham Playhouse, and Adam Penford's production of The Madness of George III. Alan Bennett's enduring play looks at the institution of royalty in all its alienness and pomp, and the frail, sometimes banal humanity holding it up.

Theatre review: Vincent River

A production of Vincent River eight years ago was one of the plays that established Philip Ridley as one of my absolute favourite playwrights, so a revival at the Park Theatre's studio space was something to get excited about. First produced in 2001 but with elements that are sadly still relevant with the rise in homophobic hate crime since the Brexit vote, the titular Vincent is what the play's characters have in common, but we never see him because he died 18 weeks earlier, beaten to death in a Shoreditch cottage. His mother Anita (Louise Jameson,) who claims never to have suspected her son's sexuality, has just moved to Dagenham to get away from the scene of the crime and the backlash from her neighbours, but she's not got away from everyone who's interested in her story - a young man has been stalking her, not particularly subtly so she's well aware he's there.