War Horse (NT at Home)
Verdict: Saddle up and ride!
Julie (NT at Home)
Rating: 
Verdict: Thin and tawdry
Now Lockdown 3 is upon us, you may worry that theatrical rations will start to run low. Fear not!
We still have plenty in our stockpile, with a good supply of new material promised on various websites.
Take the National Theatre’s digital NT at Home (ntathome.com). Here, you can find perhaps the greatest theatrical production of the past two decades: War Horse.
I’d been saving this for a rainy day, but I think we can safely assume that day has come. After all, who among us does not feel a bit like Michael Morpurgo’s stallion, drafted into battle and made to drag cast-iron cannons through the fields of France during World War I?
Joey is never at rest: breathing, twitching, shuddering, galloping; radar-ears revolving, tail swishing away imaginary flies. The three actors who operate Joey (two inside working the legs, one out front controlling the head) seem to vanish after a couple of minutes
But it’s also a story of redemption, and we can all use a bit of that hay to chew on.
I’ll never forget the first time I saw the life-size puppet of Joey, the Devonshire horse, on stage at the National Theatre. It was a moment that still takes my breath away — and the good news, for those who’ve never had the pleasure, is that it loses little of its magic on the small screen.
Joey is never at rest: breathing, twitching, shuddering, galloping; radar-ears revolving, tail swishing away imaginary flies.
The three actors who operate Joey (two inside working the legs, one out front controlling the head) seem to vanish after a couple of minutes.
Marianne Elliott and Tom Morris’s ground-breaking production is assisted by lighting that brings the puppets to life (five horses and a rogue goose).
There is lush pastoral music for the scenes in Devon, shrill brass for the alarms of war, and sweet yearning folk songs that console throughout.
I’ll never forget the first time I saw the life-size puppet of Joey, the Devonshire horse, on stage at the National Theatre
The human characters do well, too; with Alistair Brammer steadfast in his devotion to Joey, through family feuds and German gunfire.
Ian Shaw’s German soldier redeems the Huns, through his love of Joey on the other side of the trenches. And who can resist Paul Hawkyard’s Windsor Davies-esque Sgt Thunder?
Arguably too much Deutsch gets sprechen in the second half; and the chaos of battle can become confusing. But War Horse remains emotionally engrossing through every scene. Please don’t miss it — it will gallop off screens on Wednesday.
Less uplifting, but also on NT at Home, is Polly Stenham’s play Julie. It’s based on August Strindberg’s notoriously brutal battle of the sexes in 19th-century Sweden, Miss Julie.
Stenham shifts it to a millionaire’s mansion in Hampstead, where our Trustafarian heroine Julie (Vanessa Kirby) is celebrating her 33rd birthday with enough booze and cocaine to take out the Household Cavalry. Still just about sentient, she has her lurching libido trained on Daddy’s chauffeur.
Carrie Cracknell’s production manages to be both prissy and squalid, with Eric Kofi Abrefa’s chauffeur Jean shorn of his character’s predatory, self-serving misogyny; and Kirby’s Julie reduced to an addict in freefall whose mantra is ‘money, money, money . . . and then you die’.
There’s a grisly encounter with a Kitchen Aid food processor in an all-white set that looks like a morgue. Orgiastic dancing creates some passing interest, but it amounts to thin, tawdry, moralising melodrama.
There is plenty more colourful fare on other websites, though.
Digital Theatre (digitaltheatre.com) is featuring David Suchet and Zoe Wanamaker in Arthur Miller’s harrowing post-war drama All My Sons; Anna Chancellor and Toby Stephens in Noel Coward’s zingy couples’ comedy Private Lives; and Suranne Jones in Jonathan Harvey’s coming out play, Beautiful Thing.
On Marquee TV (marquee.tv) meanwhile, there’s a wealth of Shakespeare from the RSC in Stratford, including Antony Sher as Falstaff in Henry IV Parts 1 and 2 and David Tennant in Richard II.
And thespie.com has links to loads of shows and musicals across multiple websites.
I, however, will be exploring Broadway HD, to find out what our U.S. friends have to offer. Next week I have my eye on Kevin Kline in Noel Coward’s Present Laughter. Happy foraging.
The mime on the moon
Space Panorama (London International Mime Festival; mimelondon.com)
Rating: 
Verdict: Fly me to the Moon
London’s International Mime Festival can usually be counted on to offer theatre critics a glimmer of hope in the dark days of January.
This year is no exception. The 45-year-old event will be streaming some of its greatest hits; and tucked away among the standard visions of tortured nightmares and existential angst (1990-1999 category) is Andrew Dawson’s delightful recreation of the 1969 lunar landing; performed with only the artist’s head and hands.
The 24-minute film opens with Dawson in darkness, the rising sun slowly illuminating a crescent of his silvery hair. He begins by illustrating Gavin Robertson’s narration (a brief history of our attachment to the Moon), and then we blast off in Nasa’s Apollo rocket.
Shostakovich’s 10th Symphony provides drama; Robertson’s soothing voice makes a calming counterpoint. The result is somewhere between Tony Hart’s Vision On and a Zen Buddhist mindfulness video. Click on ‘Videotheque 1’, scroll down . . . and lift off.
P.M.
Vulture
Mail critics’ pick of the week’s must-see events
On TV
Dolly Parton
Rhinestones and cowboy hats will be a dime a dozen — alongside hits such as Jolene and 9 To 5 — when two BBC channels showcase the songs of Dolly Parton tonight. The entertainment starts on BBC2 with the documentary Here I Am, tracing her rise from rural Tennessee.
Two landmark live recordings are also being aired on BBC4: a 2019 concert marking her 50th year as a member of Nashville’s Grand Ole Opry, and her 2014 Glastonbury appearance.
Tonight at 9.10pm on BBC2 and 10.40pm on BBC4.
Adrian Thrills
On Display
The Prado’s Timeline
Now that’s what I call an interactive website! The Prado’s Timeline works with seamless links, revealing the worldwide context of a work of art while pointing to related paintings in the collection.
Study individual paintings (such as Goya’s Saturn Devouring One Of His Children) up close, look at videos and much more.
Prado Museum, Madrid: museodelprado.es/en/the-collection/timeline
Robin Simon
On Film
Wonder Woman 1984
With cosmically unfortunate timing, Wonder Woman 1984, starring Gad Gadot and Kristen Wiig as a formidable villain, opened in cinemas on the day last month that Tier 3 regulations closed hundreds of screens nationwide.
But now the movie is available on ‘premium streaming channels’ and it’s worth seeing — exhilarating, fun and perfect family escapism.
Brian Viner
With cosmically unfortunate timing, Wonder Woman 1984, starring Gad Gadot and Kristen Wiig as a formidable villain, opened in cinemas on the day last month that Tier 3 regulations closed hundreds of screens nationwide
On Stage
Mischief movie night in
The team behind Mischief Movie Night are back, bringing light relief from their ‘emergency comedy bunker’.
From the same stable as the Magic/Play That Goes Wrong, the show features the troupe improvising mad movie ideas suggested by the audience — online, or via social media. January 23-31; tickets £10 mischiefcomedy.com
Patrick Marmion