Frankenstein

Directed by Danny Boyle, starring Jonny Lee Miller and Benedict Cumberbatch. If you've not heard of this coming out, and are thinking that maybe you should have, that may well be because it's not strictly a film. It's part of the National Theatre's NT Live programme, which are a series of stage plays broadcast live to cinemas nationwide. This is, without doubt, one of the best, most obvious ideas ever, and one which presumably has only become possible with the advent of digital projection.

This isn't the first one I've been to, but it's the first I'm claiming as my weekly cinema visit; mostly I think because it actually feels pretty cinematic. Also, I went to see it twice, and so I haven't had much time for anything else this month, and I need to pad the numbers somehow.

Why did I go see it twice? Because it's two performances. Miller and Cumberbatch have apparently been switching the roles of Frankestein and Creature night by night. Like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOXnQLiMTpw

Obviously, the story is the classic - Creature is created, thrown out into the cruel world, and thus is educated in the ways of cruelty. It's very interesting to watch two actors take that basis, and interpret exactly the same script in very different ways. In Benedict Cumberbatch's hands, the Creature seems like a person recovering from a debilitating brain injury or stroke, slowly relearning the way his body works, and overcoming its limitations. And thus, the play becomes about how we treat disabled people, and the rage they must feel at being marginalised by society. When it's Johnny Lee Miller's turn, the Creature is more of an infant, new to the world, learning as he goes, and the film is much more about ideas like nature vs nurture, and how people become who they are through how they're treated in formative years.

It's hard to say which is better - and a false dichotomy to believe that one of them has to be. Ultimately, I think the production is better for having these two aspects to it.

Overall, the production isn't without its weakness; I don't think the stage adaptation is particularly brilliant, and early on in the play where the world is being presented as a confusing place for the Creature, the staging is a bit self-indulgent. But once that's done with, and the Creature's off to meet its maker in good old fashioned melodramatic style, and from then on it's full tilt towards the suitably gruesome conclusion.

You should definitely seek out future NT Live productions. You get to see top notch live theatre, and with a bit of luck, the widening audience might go some way towards the arts being cost effective again.