Bread And Circuses

Today was a food day. Having restocked our cupboards with our click and collect yesterday, we went on a mission to see how quickly we could eat our way back to bare shelves and an empty freezer again.

I think it may be a symptom of the lockdown. Everyone I know talks about being constantly hungry. It’s possible our brains have been tricked into thinking its time to start the hibernation cycle. It must be a very good trick, because last time I looked we were not bears. However, whatever the cause we are all finding ourselves constantly hungry and sleepy. This makes meal times slightly difficult. Everyone wants to eat, no one wants to cook. This evening, we had salad.

The other reason we’re struggling to keep our eyes open is that we decided to have another attempt at the National Theatre. I used to think I was a fairly arty person. I like films, I like music. Surely the theatre is just another branch of the creative arts. Certainly, I’ve had a whale of a time watching Dick Whittington, and if that isn’t theatre, then what is.

Well, it turns out that another thing that isn’t theatre is character development and story. Joachin has been given access to the National Theatre website as part of his English schoolwork but, in exchange, he actually has to watch some plays. This does not seem to be a particularly good bargain. To keep him company, we agreed to watch the plays with him. This, also, seems to be lacking in the ‘great deals’ department. Most of the plays run at around the three hour mark. This means we can’t even start watching a play unless we’ve got in snacks and have made adequate arrangements for toilet breaks. In addition, while I’m sure there are many plays we’d actually enjoy, school English courses do seem to rather veer away from enjoyable and instead focus on worthy. A surprising number of young readers have been put off literature by being given a copy of Bleak House and being told, ‘you’ll like this one. This is one of the comedies.’

Still, we will persevere. We’ve enjoyed theatre before. I thought the Barbican’s version of Swallows and Amazons was a remarkable improvement on the book. I’m also quite looking forward to Frankenstein, particularly since Benedict Cumberbatch is in it.

But the main reason I think we will enjoy these plays, despite their length, despite their somewhat over-expositional first acts, despite the fact that they all seem to think they’re the first cast to think of acting part of a scene in fake slow motion, is that we have a secret weapon. We have a get-out clause.

We have a fast forward button.

And I think we’re going to use it.