I'll See You in My Streams

For the past few years, I've written here about the wonderful National Theatre Live.  The short version is that it's a program that streams live productions of the National Theatre in England to movie houses around the world.  (They're live in certain areas, but for the most part, because of time differences, the shows are time -- and often, date -- delayed.)

Well, because theaters are closed down these days, the National Theatre Live series announced that they will be streaming "family friendly" productions from their archives online for free every Thursday for the next month at least.  (It may continue.)  Shows will begin at 7 PM UK time, though they don't have to be streamed at home that particular Thursday, but each will be available from its starting date.

You can get access to it all and with more information here.

Better still, as readers of these pages know, one of the shows they did is something I've repeatedly raved about and admonished people to go see when National Theatre Live has repeated -- One Man, Two Guvnors. It's absolutely wonderful, a hilarious farce, and when it subsequently played on Broadway, the star James Corden won the Tony Award as Best Actor.  Well...here's the good news:  One Man, Two Guvnors is going to be the first production they stream for free, starting this coming Thursday.

If one doesn’t like farces, it’s not for you, but otherwise it’s a joy  The story centers on a total dimwit who gets hired to work for a thug – he then gets an even better offer to work for the thug’s rival.  He takes both jobs, but can’t tell either one of them.  And from there, the story spins out of total control.
 
Here's a one-minute clip from the show --

Here's how TimeOut in London describes the program.  It's largely the same information as I noted above, though with a bit more detail --

"As numerous theatrical institutions across the world have opened up their archives in response to increasing lockdown restrictions, all eyes have remained on one organisation: the National Theatre in London, which has the greatest archive of cinema-quality recordings of stage plays of any theatre on the planet, thanks to its formidable NT Live programme. It’s designed to beam productions from the NT into cinemas across the country, but there are of course no cinemas in operation at present. So the NT is switching to its YouTube channel. From April 2, under the banner of National Theatre at Home, every Thursday (7pm GMT/2pm EST) will see a new National Theatre play released – free to watch for one week – along with bonus content including cast and creative Q&As and post-stream talks.

"There’s a definite emphasis on family-friendly good cheer for the line-up so far, which kicks off with a big hitter: Richard Bean’s beloved farce ‘One Man, Two Guvnors’, starring a pre-chat-show-days James Corden. Over the next few weeks you can expect a string of family-friendly titles, though naturally there will be those hoping for some of the real NT Live blockbusters, notably ‘Hamlet’ and ‘Frankenstein’ starring Benedict Cumberbatch and ‘Coriolanus’ starring Tom Hiddleston."