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With his crown under threat from enemies both foreign and domestic, Henry IV prepares for war. Having deposed the previous king, he is only too aware how tenuous his position is and the price to be paid if he falters.
As the king prepares to defend his crown, his son Prince Hal is languishing in the taverns and brothels of London, revelling in the company of his friend, the notorious Sir John Falstaff. With the onset of the war, Hal and Falstaff are thrust into the brutal reality of the battlefield, where Hal must confront his responsibilities to family and throne.
This 2014 RSC production of Shakespeare’s history play was directed by the company’s artistic director, Gregory Doran, and features Sir Antony Sher in the role of Falstaff.
Drama about a bullied young woman miscarrying at work. Trainee warehouse manager Megan is desperate to keep her new job and bullies her pregnant friend Alys to get her 'pick rate' up.
A new Royal Shakespeare Company production for 2022 of one of Shakespeare's best-loved romantic comedies, filmed in Stratford-upon-Avon. In a colourful world where anything feels possible, two very different couples fall in love. With dastardly plots, hilarious slapstick and some of Shakespeare’s wittiest dialogue, Roy Alexander Weise directs this classic tale of matchmaking and manipulation.
In 1895, in cell 3, floor 3, in Reading Gaol, we find Prisoner C33. Starved, thin, and with his hair crudely hacked short, he is confined alone in this dark cell, denied water to wash himself with and refused access to a toilet.
Prisoner C33 – real name Oscar Wilde – is a dramatist of genius, poet, wit, novelist, husband, father of two children and, until recently, the darling of London society. He has been imprisoned for the crime of having participated in a homosexual relationship. He is struggling to reconcile his identity as a creative genius with the trauma of his treatment as a despised criminal.
In despair, and fearing the onset of insanity, he fantasises about being in conversation with his former self – the elegant, debonair, famous, popular, long-haired, flamboyant Oscar Wilde before this nightmare began. Their talk, Oscar with Oscar, is full of Wildean wit, mischievous humour, nostalgia, philosophical insight, and sardonic wisdom. But as he contemplates his fall from grace
Floodlights shows how, in November 2016, former professional footballer Andy Woodward, who once played for Bury FC and Sheffield Utd, found the courage to go public about the horrific sexual abuse he was subjected to by his youth coach, paedophile Barry Bennell.
His testimony encouraged hundreds more men who had suffered abuse in similar circumstances, many at the hands of Bennell himself, to come forward, exposing a deeply hidden scandal at the heart of our national game.
The drama follows Andy’s life, from his childhood as a passionate footballer with the world at his feet, to the man who could no longer bury the truth. It also examines how Bennell was able to groom young players and their families as he held the power to make their dreams come true.
Leon, a mixed-race boy, and Jake, his white baby brother, are separated after their mother has a breakdown. Leon is determined to find him and gets unexpected support along the way.
Soon there will be more voice-activated digital assistants than people. All are female-gendered. Roger needs company, and he doesn’t want a dog. When his daughter Erin buys him the latest Isla digital assistant, an unexpected relationship between man and technology emerges. But who's really in control?
This thought-provoking, and at times troubling, dark comedy written by playwright Tim Price, has been adapted for television following its world premiere at Theatr Clwyd in North Wales. It was helmed by the theatre’s artistic director Tamara Harvey and stars Mark Lambert as retired teacher Roger, who is struggling with lockdown following the death of his wife.
Lisa Zahra plays his concerned-but-busy daughter, who thinks a smart speaker is the perfect home help for her lonely dad, but never imagined it would lead to a visit from the police as well as surprising and sometimes upsetting revelations from his past.
Expect laughs, technology-induced frustration and some strong language.
Lucy Kirkwood’s Maryland takes us to the dark heart of male violence against women but manages to do so with humour and wit. An outstanding cast explores an urgent issue.
Inspired by a childhood memory of an old vinyl recording in the family home, Ralph Fiennes revisited TS Eliot’s Four Quartets during the 2020 lockdown, wondering if it could be given a theatrical treatment rather than merely recited.
Theatre producers James Dacre of the Royal and Derngate theatres, and Danny Moar of the Theatre Royal Bath, got behind Fiennes’s idea. Hildegard Bechtler, Chris Shutt and Tim Lutkin created the set and costume design, sound and stage lighting, with Fiennes directing the production, which toured UK regional theatres and ran at the Pinter Theatre, London, in December 2021.
This film, directed by Ralph’s sister Sophie, known for her work with Michael Clark, Grace Jones and les ballets C de la B, was made immediately after the live performances. The set and lighting were transported overnight from the West End and re-rigged in English National Ballet’s production studio.
Sweden, 1863. A country not much visited by Englishmen. An exception is the inquisitive Mr Wraxhall, whose innocent rummaging through the archives of the noble de la Gardie family takes a sinister turn.
Wraxhall becomes fascinated by the long-dead founder of the dynasty, the fearsome Count Magnus, a tyrannical ruler who dabbled in alchemy and who once made a strange journey to the Holy Land on most unholy business. Despite the warnings of his hosts, Wraxhall is drawn ever deeper into the Count’s dark world and discovers that the dreaded aristocrat may not lie easy in his tomb...
Mark Gatiss stars as Jacob Marley in his own theatrical retelling of Dickens’s classic winter ghost story, with Nicholas Farrell as Scrooge. Directed for the stage by Adam Penford, this powerful tale of life, love, loss and redemption is as relevant today as when it was first published in 1843. Filled with Dickensian, spine-tingling special effects, prepare to be frightened and delighted in equal measure as you enter the supernatural Victorian world of A Christmas Carol.
It’s a cold Christmas Eve and mean-spirited miser Ebenezer Scrooge has an unexpected visit from the spirit of his former business partner Jacob Marley. Bound in chains as punishment for a lifetime of greed, the unearthly figure explains it isn’t too late for Scrooge to change his miserly ways in order to escape the same fate, but first he’ll have to face three more eerie encounters…
