King Lear, Almeida

 So I've been waiting for it for what, ten years? Seems like it. But it was announced a year ago Jonathan Pryce, Jonathan Pryce, my favourite actor, master of despair, break-down acting and also comedy and musical, Jonathan Pryce would be doing King Lear. I almost didn't get a ticket! I waited up til midnight and got two of the last seats. Thank you appendix, wherever you are now (insinerated I hope) thank you for waiting for after the play to start exploding! Jonathan was great. There have been so many Lears recently, Jacobi, McKellen, Poslethwaite, did Patrick Stewart do one too? How would Jonathan play it? Well, as I always excpected, and of course hoped, he played it sexually! The reason the other daughters hated him and Cordelia so much was that he'd abused them and not her. It makes sense! And we're not talking abused one time, he's still doing it! Even though both daughters are married and have their own castles!! What a shit! I was happy he died. Edmund was particularly good too, he played it Geordie and every single thing he said was so easily accessible compared to the way some of the other actors delivered their Shakespeare. I'm sure it's something to do with him being a Geordie... Anyway, maybe it was my appendicitis kicking in and making me crazy but when Jonathan Pryce was being uber disgusting and filthy sexual, while other members of the audience (Alison, Bill Paterson, etc.) were vomitting into their handbags I was all like 'phoar!'
I will never get over how ace he is.

Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2011 Part Two

Simon Munnery's Show, well, I was really drunk,and that just made it all the more magical. Especially the bubble hat. My favourite part- apart from the video of the Gillette eight bladed razor advert set in the 1940s- was the Sherlock Holmes monologue. Ace.
The Carroll Myth at Sweet on the Grassmarket was recommended to me by pals DBS. Great script, it was really well acted and staged -and the costumes were lovely. I liked all the instantly recognisable bits of Alice but also liked the not so recognisable bits. The Cheshire cat was cleverly done, played by three actresses in identicle cat suits just appearing in different parts of the room- including on the audience's lap!
Richard Herring, I see him every year, I saw him three times this year, and who knows maybe I'll see him again on Sunday or Monday! I went to recordings of his Edinburgh Podcast which are really great, two different comics on every day, one for chatting with and the other to do a five minute bit to promote their show. I saw Al Murray and he was great because he wasn't the one doing the five minute bit, he wasn't the pub landlord who Murray descibed jovially as "just a fucking idiot!" he was an Oxford boy talking to another Oxford boy and giggling. So much fun.
And of course I also saw Rich's excellent show, What Is Love, Anyway? Calum and I went and though Rich spends the entire hour just shouting it is very very good and he even managed to shout some quite sensitive stuff that sort of proves that Love is definitely something.
Faust/Us the one-man show of Doctor Faustus is so fucking terrifying and clever and exhausting and innovative I don't know how to review it! The show relies completely on Calum breathing in exactly the same places each night, the one hour projection of film, animation, puppetry and sound rolls while the actor acts around it playing all the characters convincingly with as little as a simple change of stance!
I think it's really brilliant that Calum has managed to use that animation degree even if it's just knowledge of how things work on screen. The film alone would be an amazing show but it's great that it's been useful for what he is actually going to do for the rest of his life, perform.
Fordie! I went to see Matt Forde's show Dishonourable Member and I fucking loved it. Though Matt must have sweat an entire ocean I still found myself a bit in love with him. That's what politics will do to a girl. Oh, is it just me? Just me who found Fordie's sports style commentary to an imaginary Labour Party win extremely emotional? Just me and Fordie who feel as strongly about Oasis as they do about the Labour Party? Yes. Fordie's show was for me, that's why I went on my own, the boy himself says that his opinions usually split the room, my opinions do too, that's why I came on my own, and it was brill. Bonus for the Alan Partridge sex jokes, we've all been there, mate.
Jon Richardson's written a book called It's Not Me, it's You. He's in Edinburgh doing some readings, no show this year, a book instead! I look forward to reading it all and agreeing with it all. Vis Fordie and the Labour Party, Jon Richardson and me are OCD buddies. Fuck, when it comes to cleaning and organising, I am up there with the mentalists. I get angry when I'm eating dinner because the plate I'm eating off is dirty- this sounds normal, of course you would be, that's disgusting! No. I mean that I have to clean everything I've used to cook with before I can eat the meal I've made and it bothers me that because the dinner is on the plate that plate now needs to be cleaned but I can't do it until after I've eaten it despite the fact I just DID all the washing up.
Yeah... Not even Jon would be that crazy.
Anyway, I hope he's ok, in the future I mean. I know I will be, because though I'm crazy, I enjoy washing up and cleaning up, and whoever I end up with will have to deal with the fact that I want to do those things- not to make their lives easier, but so I know it's done properly.

A Woman Killed With Kindness (National Theatre)

After War Horse we went back to the National and saw this. I have to say I was extremely disappointed.
I get so annoyed when the National doesn't deliver. Peter Hall's Twelfth Night was so boring and uninventive. This modern-day (well, 1919) version of Heywood's 17th century play at least looked inventive. Two beautiful interiors filled the stage and the costumes and the way the characters moved around were very beautiful.
But it was slow and it was boring.
The actors did their best, well, sort of, there was a lot of crashing and bashing of the set over the dialogue at the beginning which was very irritating, you couldn't hear anything!
My main problem though was with the story. If you're going to set a play where a woman starves herself to death in a different period to when it was written, don't set it at a time where it just wouldn't have happened! I can see the parallel the director was trying to make with the ol' sufferagettes, but it seemed so unlikely that the characters around Anne would have let her do that to herself. It was ridiculous and it just ended, suddenly.

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.

Worzel Gummidge (1979-1981)

Worzel is one of my earliest book-memories, audio-book-memories and tv-memories. Somehow I remember all three when I try and think back as far as I can... I can picture Worzel falling backwards in Ten-acre Field very clearly as he does in the end credits of the TV show I watched repeats of as a child. I can hear Jon Pertwee's voice proposing marriage to a lady scarecrow and then telling her he's going to kick her head off if she doesn't accept him from the audio book I listened to when I first had tonsilitis. And I can see the illustrations of ferocious Aunt Sally, the one in the book, the one who's actually his aunt- not his cruel but cute love interest.
I got the boxset of Worzel for Christmas, I haven't watched the series they made six years later in New Zealand, I'm not sure if I should... I've just finished watching the 30 original episodes and I think I will wait a while before tainting it, I often wish I'd never seen the second series of Catweazle.
I feel both happy and extremely sad while watching Worzel, the British countryside and village teashop, climbing over fences and kids wearing clothes that could be from any time between 1945 and 1985. I feel like it was my childhood -especially my holidays, but maybe it wasn't, maybe it was the things I read in my childhood and I'm just remembering it wrong. It makes me sad that childhood isn't going to be like that for future kids and sad that what I draw and how I think is nostalgic, when I draw children they look like Susan and John. And that's just the look of Worzel. The characters and the scripts they make me happy and sad too.
I remember enjoying the books as a child, but they are odd books, they are amusing, but they're quite sinister. Worzel was a sometimes angry sometimes miserable weirdo, completely disinterested in the children, just going about his business. Lots of these classic kids' books and TV shows rely on the idea that children have secret friendships with these grown-up freaks (Stig of the Dump, Worzel, Catweazle, et al.) No wonder TV has got so boring, kids wouldn't be allowed to be friends with a creepy old scarecrow nowadays.
The TV show doees have the odd unsettling episode every now and then- these are the ones that stick to the books quite well and usually feature Geoffrey Bayldon wheeling about on his bike dressed as an undertaker- but there are jolly episodes too with singing and dancing and cake throwing. The main thrill for me comes from Una Stubbs' superb comic timing, I think she is the funniest woman I've ever seen, I only remembered Aunt Sally from the books- and I was scared of her. If I'd have remembered Una I would have smiled more widely at her when she walked past me last August in Chichester. She is perfectly horrible and aggressive, but so amusing, physically she is brilliantly funny, a look from her, a subtle grab at a plate of sausages or watching her cram a cake into her mouth has me laughing out loud. She was very physically funny in the two plays I saw last year, but she didn't feature heavily, maybe that's why I didn't mention her.
And yet it is because of this re-written character that Worzel is such a tragic programme, I watched an episode today where kind, giggly Dolly Clothes Peg (a pretty manequin played by Lorraine Chase) asks Worzel to marry her but Worzel chooses the selfish cruel wooden doll who will never love him instead despite knowing this and knowing he could be happy with the other. The last shot was of Dolly Clothes Peg looking back for a moment with her fingers crossed before turning back to her lonely walk home with tears rolling down her face.
So many episodes, I'd say more than half, end with a character being disappointed by their own existence. And usually so disappointed that they are weeping! I mean, god! It's utterly tragic! and then it cuts to the jolly theme tune!
I like things that make me sad, I enjoy Worzel all the more when after a chaotic episode we see Aunt Sally with all her dreams of grandeur and adventure looking sadly out of her attic window knowing she's just a fairground doll. Or lovestruck Worzel believing Sal when she says she'll look after his money then watching her march straight into a clothes shop and spending it before he walks away with tears in his eyes. It's not just a children's show then, it's reality! It's so sad. Remember when Catweazle disappeared and Carrot just walked sadly back to his farm, that was perfect! I don't want to watch the New Zealand episodes and find they are not tragic, I think that would be completely awful.

The English Patient (1996)

The English Patient is my sister's favourite film, she carries this picture of Ralph Fiennes and Kirsten Scott-Thomas dancing together in her wallet. My favourite film is The Elephant Man, I do not carry a picture of John Merrick.

I think what Anna likes about The English Patient is the passion between the lovers, it's pretty intense! I think she likes how real and horrifically painful their love seems to be- and it helps that they're both gorgeous! The film is gorgeous, it looks beautiful and it sounds beautiful, it has a really good musical score. It's a tragic romance and that's what Anna likes to write about.

So what do I like to write about? Isolation and loneliness, horrible nasty bastards and drunks. I love The Elephant Man, it has the real life tragedy yeah, I like tragedy too but more importantly it has over the top theatrical performances, which I adore, it has a good musical score and it looks like a black and white illustration. I watched Anna's favourite film with her last night but no one ever wants to watch The Elephant Man with me.

The Devil's Backbone (2001)

Lauren and I watched a lot of films last night, Green Card, Three Men and a Baby, Lesbian Vampire Killers, Sleepy Hollow and The Devil's Backbone. Jeez, that is a lot, we did have the most appalling hangovers though, so it was ok, and we were in bed by 0ne (that gives you a good idea what time we started watching).

Anyway, apart from Lesbian Vampire Killers I had seen everything before- Three Men and a Baby is so sexist! How did I never notice?! It was horrible, like feminism was something that happened to other people. Luckily we made chocolate brownies and had dinner with that one just playing in the background. Sleepy Hollow is great fun, I love a good British ensemble! Claire Skinner was in it! Never noticed her before! Lauren saw that The Devil's Backbone was on Film4 after Sleepy Hollow and said "that's a great film!" so I said; "let's go!" We had bought the Shining and planned to watch that as our scary movie finale but I'd have much rather seen something I hadn't seen before and Lauren was asleep anyway so I watched it quietly, spellbound.

Much better than Pan's Labyrinth! Way better! So well acted!! It was scary but compelling, the supernatural element didn't get in the way of the Spanish Civil War story at all! I was gripped by both stories, more by the real one though- I did find the ghost boy a bit terrifying so I was glad that it mostly focused on the relationships of all the alive people in the school!

A young man to make out with and an older man for poetry? I get it.

Hamlet (National Theatre)

Finally! Finally after two years of thinking about it constantly we got to see Rory Kinnear's Hamlet.

I think one of my first posts here was about Kenny Brannagh's Hamlet, always a favourite, started my Shakespeare obsession as well as my troublesome actor obsession. I think I spent a lot of the review comparing it to David Tennant's Hamlet, which I saw a couple of times and enjoyed, but this is the one, the one I had been waiting for... Beloved Rory!

I have probably talked about Rory in glowing terms here before, but let me just recap, I first saw him in the NT's The Man of Mode, an excellent fool, apparently it was after his show-stealing, award-winning success in this that they decided he would play Hamlet, but first they had to show him off, no one is going to come and see Roy Kinnear's son play Hamlet, no one's even heard of him! So they gave him some starring roles; wastrel son in The Philistines, desperate, blood-thirsty and betrayed in The Revengers Tragedies, clever, very clever angry young man in Burnt by the Sun. Such success! All amazing! All perfection and so different!! On a break he did Measure for Measure at the Almeida and got married and is now pregnant (dagger through our hearts, Rory!) But here is Hamlet!

David Tennant found much success in his comic Hamlet, he played it funny, his Hamlet was a character. Rory does not play a character, he plays THE character. He is the written Hamlet, he obviously understands it all, and because the actor understands what he is acting, my god, the audience knows too! Every meaning was crystal clear, it was all about the words- THE WORDS!

He's a clever actor. And you do need to be clever to deliver something clever- like when I saw The Power of Yes and only understood certain actors, because if a stupid actor recites some lines it usually doesn't matter, he's still an actor, he can make it work. If some pretty, spiky haired Scottish boy tells you the Earth is about to explode that's fine, we can get that, but if he doesn't get it, I'm not going to either... Tennant was good, he found jokes in it, but seeing Rory, well there's SO MUCH MORE! God, Shakespeare is so good when Rory does it!! He's a clever bastard!!

Now let's talk why the production all over was glorious.

The set, for a change at the National Theatre, was lackluster, but it didn't matter, not once the acting started, and if, like I say, acted by compelling actors, who gives a shit what the set was like? This production was all about the words. The idea of a totalitarian state was conveyed in the Tennant Hamlet through surveilance cameras littering the set (in the BBC film version anyway)- that was it. In Nicholas Hytner's current production it is truly TERRIFYING. The addresses to the state are done to camera for the people and when finished the mood in the palace changes completely, is everything a lie? No soliloquy is unheard, Claudius' people are everywhere, Ophelia is bugged while confronting Hamlet, the players are all killed instantly for knowing too much! Ophelia is murdered for the inconvenience of her madness! Claudius is a cold fucking psycho.

At last, in Patrick Malahide you see a Claudius who did not kill for love, he killed solely for that crown! And his alchy bride Claire Higgins' Gertrude is expendable, after a while you get the feeling she went along with the marriage just to stay alive! It's only the booze that keeps her smiling! The ghost! Of course she sees the ghost!- She believes her son! Because a mother would!! Brilliant direction. Claudius was evil, just evil. After seeing this version I just found both Tennant's and Brannagh's so unbelievable, their characters' motives seemed all wrong, both of those Hamlets were full of love, this is not a Shakespeare romance, it's a fucking tragedy! Everyone was full of bile and evil! Brilliant!!

God, I loved it, I fucking loved it.

King Lear (York Theatre Royal)

Anna and I went to a fundraising event in York, it was a recorded reading of King Lear with a bunch of well known actors, they were there firstly to raise money for the theatre and secondly to celebrate the life and work of Freddie Jones -who played Lear.

Well, we certainly celebrated his life afterwards as I got to go after-partying way into the night and had far too much to drink! But I shall review the reading not the party, maybe i should have a separate blog for parties- though it wouldn't say anything because the best parties are the ones I'm too pissed to remember!

Freddie was great as Lear but the people I really enjoyed were Patterson Joseph as Edgar, the guy who played Kent and all the girls- particulalry Niamh Cusack's horrible flirty Goneril. I liked meeting her afterwards she was lovely. I told Freddie that he was my favourite Ghost of Motley Hall and that made him laugh, especially as I added "Don't tell Nick," who was of course there too, how else could I go to the after-party!? So Nick le Prevost played Gloucester and it turns out hearing someone get their eyes ripped out is still as horrific as watching it.

I will stick a picture up here when the theatre posts some- (edit: rubbish photo!)

Women Beware Women -Middleton (National Theatre)

This production is now over!! Anna and I were supposed to see it in previews a few months ago but you know, I got sick and stayed sick for a very long time. But we managed to go down to London specifically to see it the day before it closed and it was magnificent!

I was expecting a massacre of Revenger's Tragedy (2008) proportions so when the final balletic death-dance came along I was pleased that there was an amazingly choreographed bloodbath but relieved that it wasn't bloody like the disturbing scenes I remembered from the last restoration tragedy I'd seen at the National. Yes, the final scene was amazingly well done, really beautiful and spine chilling without being disgusting, it was terrifying! One after another after another gets their revenge and is killed until there is no one left, wow, it made all the hairs on my arms stand on end!

Anyway, some brilliant performances. I went to see Sam Barnett and Harriet Walter, neither disappointed. Barnett did his usual cute Posner act (Awwww!! Posner betrayed!! Awwww!!) and Walter was outstanding, seemingly unknowingly cold and calculating in the first act and then a giggly girly so taken with the young boy in the second. Oh! That character was me! That was my future!! My two husbands dead and buried and then along comes Posner, a beautiful blond boy, sigh, swoon! I adore him!! Ugh, I'm going to be such a predator when I'm old. But enough about my horrible self-realisation. Harriet was amazing, a wonderful strong lead and she is stunning!

But there were discoveries too! That's what we love!! Discovering young actors! The two girls were good, especially Lauren O'Neil who had the stage presence of a young Alex Kingston, what a deep powerful voice that little blonde has!! But this is what it's all about folks... This was the same feeling the first time I saw Rory Kinnear on stage in The Man of Mode (2007), the same wide smile on my face, the inability to take my eyes off him whenever he was on stage. Harry Melling is hilarious. Who'd have thought that it would be Dudley from the Harry Potter movies who would come out of those films a promising actor. Not only is he ridiculously funny, both with delivery and physically- he is actually really good looking! I saw him in Mother Courage last year and he was playing the dim-witted son, he has been promoted to scene-stealing fool, it won't be long before he's given more opportunities. I can see his whole stage career, he is going to be brilliant.

The Grapes of Wrath (ETT- West Yorkshire Playhouse)

John Steinbeck! The Richest Author in the Dust Bowl!

The English Touring Theatre does not disappoint. The Hypochondriac was still a good production just of a slightly embarrassing script- I blame Roger McGough, though really Moliere is to blame, he loved toilet humour. Anyway, I saw the ETT do Uncle Vanya a couple of years ago and that was a wonderful production, it looked beautiful and everyone involved was suibtably beautifully tragic.

Here we have Steinbeck's classic American novel adapted for the stage and played out by a company of English actors... I had American Suzie with me and she loved it- and said everyone did really well with the accent, except some minor characters (Cockney guy in overalls springs to mind) and Pa played by Christopher Timothy. Otherwise Ma (Sorcha Cusack) Tom (Damian O'Hare) and Oliver Cotton were fantastic leads with convincing accents! And as always Oliver Cotton's hair and eyebrows were impressive.

This production was amazingly well done, wonderful set (though extremely minimal a hell of a lot was cleverly done within it!) and staging there was a real sense of the journey in the long first act, and even more sense of the utter hopelessness in the equally long second act! Anyway, it really puts this "depression" into perspective. I mean, we may have just lost our car and mortgage and pensions, but at least we're not all drinking somebody's tit-milk in an old barn.

The Caretaker (Liverpool Everyman Theatre)

Jonathan Pryce makes his big return to the Liverpool Everyman, the theatre that made him, the theatre that has a big photo of 'Company of 1975' in the foyer that made me squawk with excited laughter -presumably Jonathan took the photo- at first glance I managed not to see Julie Walters right in the middle or Bill Nighy lurking behind, but only Nick Le Prevost of course and his magnificent hair.

While I was in America Jonathan had a few days off because of illness (I was frantically calling the theatre yesterday to check he'd be in the matinee we'd booked) I'm reckoning a cold because the theatre was so EFFING boiling that it could only be because the actors were cold, the audience was awash with sweat. Anna felt herself drifting away at one point becacuse of the heat but because I had been looking froward to seeing it of course I was wide awake and cramming in fondant fancies for a sugar buzz that would see me through the sleepy-heat of the second half.

Aside from the theatre, the play and the performances were top notch. Well, I'm not a Pinter fan, but this was definitley the performance of his classic to see; all three actors were very very good. Tom Brooke as the nasty brother was excellently scary and vicious, I imagine David Tennant (and even Jonathan himself back in 1980) would have played the role in a very similarly nasty and manic way. Good actor that boy, nice-but-dim in that awful Richard Curtis film and then convincingly terrifying in Pinter, tres impressive. The other brother (Peter MacDonald) was very good too, his monolgue was wonderful and his practically silent performance through the rest of the play was compelling too. And of course Jonathan Pryce does not disappoint, he plays a very real character which I imagine would be very easy to overplay, he's a sad figure but my favourite bits were as usual his physical comedy. I say as usual but lots of the times I've seen Jonathan on stage the bits I like are the horrific breakdowns, there wasn't one in this so I will cling to the tragi-comedy, the wag of a finger or the roll of an eye- the surpressed pleasure and appreciation for a second-hand smoking jacket.

Dimetos (at the Donmar Warehouse until 9th May)

You lot know how I feel about Jonathan Pryce. I adore him whatever he does. But there's something so wonderful about seeing him on stage, where he belongs. He is so good, someone who has seen all his films and thinks he is good could not imagine how good he is when live.

He is the play. He's why you see the play. The other actors, no matter how well trained they are suddenly just become his props, he has such stage presence, he's spell binding.

I watched the play, my face twisted with horrible emotion (I think I scared Nick Le Prevost, he was sitting downstairs and looked up at one point to see my gurning mug; "Oh God, it's what's-her-face, looking intense! As usual!"), the story was painful to watch but impossible to look away. I was in tears- and not just because I was terribly drunk...

Ah the play, Dimetos, by Athol Fugard, directed by Douglas Hodge. The story of a brilliant engineer escaping his former life to live in the country with his niece and his rather bitter housekeeper. A Greek Tragedy in modern times, or was it? It wasn't specific, it could have been any time.

Lovely innocent niece. I read that Holliday Grainger, the actress playing Lydia is hating being on stage, she's terrified, only having done some TV until now. Well, I thought she was really excellent. And it would be a shame if she did just go back to Merlin and Robin Hood (shudder) But then maybe I just liked the way she acted, or the things she had to act. I'm always a fan of pain. I loved seeing Jonathan going mental, crying, tearing at his hair and screaming. I watched in spell-bound terror, but I loved it. And Miss Grainger too, I liked her most when she wasn't all innocent, when she figured out what was going on and ended the first act. Woo, scary scary stuff!

The cast were all good, but like I say, I'm there to see Jonathan and he does not disappoint. He was fabulous.

Nice theatre too on another note! Very cosy, liked it better than the Almeida, the only other small theatre I've been to in London. The set was suibtably bleak and interesting and the audience below me (I was on the edge of the circle) were only sometimes distracting.

Hamlet (1996)

I saw Ken Bran's Hamlet the year I started secondary school, so by my amazing maths skills I saw this film the year it came out, and I loved it. My sister and I have a tradition of trying to watch Hamlet every summer all in one go (five+ hours, quite a feat). I bought her the dvd this Christmas and we watched it last week.

Anna and I saw the RSC's production of Hamlet in Stratford this summer- which of course starred David Tennant, who we had seen previously in Edinburgh in Look Back in Anger. I think the reason why this production was so successful (even without Tennant for most of last month) is that all the actors are RSC trained, they all speak the play the same way and so if you can understand one actor you can undesrtand them all, it is made completely accessible. Anna and I only noticed this when watching Kenny's Omelete last week, we drifted off at times and it only happened with certain actors. The cast of the 1996 Hamlet are from everywhere, so classically trained Kenneth Branagh and Nick Farrell are spellbinding yet when Jack Lemmon has a go (God bless him) it's strangely boring and flat and sometimes confusing. Billy Crystal and Charlton Heston play their parts amazingly well -before you accuse me of saying Americans cant do Shakespeare, Crystal I'd say was the most succesful of all the actors at making Shakespeare understandable- Yes it's a comic part but it's still written in the same way as all the others.

When I was younger and enjoyed this film I must have known the story so well and just ignored the parts where I zoned out, and just loved the whole spectacular sight of it. God, it's so well shot, it's beautiful! And the actors are so good, so many long long scenes all in one shot!

The film is famous for using the entire unabridged script but probably more famous for the odd assortment of stars from stage, hollywood and well, Ken Dodd... It was probably this film that sparked my obsession with actors, watching Hamlet is like star spotting, only last week did I notice Rosemary Harris as the Player Queen! Fab!

While I'm drooling over actors I might as well mention how gorgeous EVERYONE is in this film; Kenny B at his best, earned the nickname 'Girdle-legs' from Anna and I because he's just so effing thin! He must have just stopped eating, knowing that he had to look fabulous! Rufus Sewell strutting around as Fortinbras, Jesus, that man is handsome, Michael Maloney even looking passable (That must be a wig!) And my favourite Nicholas Farrell as a jumpy, probably gay Horatio. Obviously Kate Winslet and Julie Christie are lovely too, but they always are...

My friend Penny studies English and Drama and she has told me that all her teachers have told them that Kenneth Branagh is rubbish and he destroys Shakespeare. Kenneth Branagh is a wonderful actor and director who has brought Shakespeare to the masses! Those teachers are out of their minds. Until you've seen Kenny on stage you are not qualified to say anything. I finally saw him live in Ivanov last December. The story was mostly awful (sorry Chekhov, I'm slamming you again) but he was so good. You waited for him to be on stage! His depression, his breakdown, his tears, were so real! So disturbing! And he frequently breaks down in Hamlet! if you watch closely the parts where he goes from quiet, to mad, to agonising breakdown, to normality- he frequently does in one shot!! He is an amazing actor and this film is him at his absolute best.