It can’t be the easiest time in history to be a political playwright; the audience could be walking into the theatre at 7:15 ready for an urgently topical exploration of the current state of affairs, but the play doesn’t start until 7:30 by which point the whole thing’s hopelessly dated. Better, as actor-turned-playwright Simon Woods does, to go for a very specific political event in the past and (apart from the obligatory deliberate winks to topical issues) let the audience draw their own parallels.
Hansard takes us to 1988, the weekend after the passing of Section 28 (which banned “the promotion of homosexuality [and] pretended family relationships” in schools,) as Conservative back-bencher Robin Hesketh (Alex Jennings) returns to his home in the Cotswolds. His wife Diana (Lindsay Duncan) is waiting for him looking dishevelled, at the very least hungover from the night before if not already a few drinks the worse for wear this morning.
