The Cherry Orchard (National Theatre Live)

This was my first 'National Theatre Live' experience, bizarrely the tickets were more expensive than actually seeing it at the National Theatre, I sat in York cinema and watched The Cherry Orchard.

I didn't bother making the trip to London to see it because despite the fact that Howard Davies' other Russian productions at the National (The White Guard and Philistines) being amazing and beautiful- and of course Conleth Hill being wonderful, I'd heard a good production of The Cherry Orchard on Radio4 a couple of years ago and that was enough for me... Also the radio didn't have Zoe Wanamaker, who I can't stand.

And it was a good production, the second half was particularly good, when the shit hits the fan in those Russian plays that's when the acting really takes off! And you know, there seemed to be less Wanamaker in the second half too, or maybe just less close ups...

That was the weird part about seeing it at the cinema, the fact that the camera dictated what I was looking at. I didn't like that at all! If I'd have been watching at the theatre I would have had my eyes on Conleth Hill or Mark Bonnar the whole time, watching how they reacted to what the others were saying, not zooming in on Tim McMullan (amusing though he is) or Charity Wakefield's big bland face.

Mark Bonnar, there's an actor I've been enjoying lately, Psychoville, Doctor Who and now great, a bit of theatre, haven't seen him on stage since Philistines and that must have been four years ago! He is one hot potato right now. I might just add the tag 'handsome' to this post. I'd still rather go for Conleth Hill though, he is one brilliant actor... If you'd never seen Rory Kinnear and someone told you that Roy Kinnear had a son who was a brilliant actor you might just picture Conleth Hill- he is a bit on the Roy Kinnear side of cuddly. And I love him.

Anyway, a play about the sadness of moving house. Don't like Zoe Wanamaker, over rated, like Simon Russell Beale. Blah. Rest of the cast: thumbs up.

The White Guard (by Mikhail Bulgakov, National Theatre)

I should be reviewing two plays today but I'm not because half way through The White Guard- which was one of the best plays I've seen for ages- I got an odd tickle in my throat that over night developed into tonsilitis and led to an exciting adventure of obtaining antibiotics through any means possible and unfortunately missing thursday night's performance of Women Beware Women.

We are fans of Russian plays, well, we are fans of the National Theatre's choice of Russian plays- seen a lot of Chekhov over the last few years at different theatres, I find it all horribly frustrating and sometimes I leave the theatre wanting to stab things. But at the National I have seen Philistines by Gorky and Burnt by the Sun by Nikitia Mikhalkov, granted both contained favourite Rory Kinnear but I've developed a taste for them now and The White Guard might have to be my favourite.

The play is about a family of Tsar loyalists (Tsarists?) in the middle of bloody civil war in the Ukraine. Yeah, they're all fucked.

The set design was astounding, Burnt by the Sun was a whole rotating house and beach, but this production made me wonder just how many miles deep the stage at the Lyttleton really is! A whole appartment with corridors leading to other rooms, a magnificent empty palace, a school gymnasium and a friggin' bombed out bunker! All these sets filled the whole stage! Where the hell did they come from!? It was seriously amazing!

Yeah, the design played a big part in making this play extremely good but the excellent ensemble probably could have carried it without bunkers, explosions and bombs dropping (nearly gave me a friggn' heart attack!), the actors were brilliant. I've seen Conleth Hill in plays before but suddenly as a charismatic love interest I was in agreement with Elena- completely in love with the big charming brute. And Paul Higgins doing his Jamie from in the Thick of It on stage but with so much warmth- just as much swearing but so likeable as a drunken captain. Justine Mitchell as Elena, the woman, such a hard part to play amongst all the men, she was wonderful, she stood out and was so real. Jeez, they were all so real and so was the friggin' war. But hell, it was still so funny! Poignant, laughably so.

I mean, those things have to go hand in hand don't they? If you are capable of understanding tragedy then you must understand comedy. Probably why those two genres are my favourites, and why I so enjoyed this play.