Best-selling author, candidate for the mayorality of London, former chair of the Conservative Party, playwright, actor and now criminal: that's the life story of Lord Jeffrey Archer, who last week was found guilty of perjury and perverting the course of justice, and was jailed for four years.
Archer first appeared onstage in his first play, The Accused, in which he played the title role. His first onstage court appearance (at the Theatre Royal Haymarket in December last year) was just days after he first appeared in court in real life, pleading not guilty to four counts of perjury.
A number of national newspapers last week carried the story that the life of former prime minister John Major is to become a stage musical, called From Minor to Major.
In fact, the story was a hoax created by the ITV programme Gatecrasher, partially as a joke but also to expose what it calls "sloppy journalism".
This year's Kids' Week, organised by SOLT, the Society of London Theatre, will run from 24th-31st August. 28 West End theatres will be making free tickets (one free child for each paying adult, other kids' tickets at half-price) available, and, in addition, there will be free meal deals and even free accommodation for kids. Kids, incidentally, are defined as between the ages of 5 and 16.
Some shows are already sold out, as over 4000 tickets went in the first two hours of booking.
Full details will be found on the Kids' Week Website.
Overall theatre attendances and revenue for April, May and June are up on last year in direct contradiction to current media speculation of falling numbers due to the foot and mouth crisis and low tourism levels. Total audience attendance for the commercial and subsidised sectors in the three months is up by over seven per cent while revenue is up 10 per cent, according to an announcement from the Society of London Theatre.
The next two years will see a rebuilding of the Young Vic which, according to artistic director David Lan, will need £400,000 in repairs in the next two years and, at the end of three years, the cost of repairing the structure could exceed the cost of a rebuild.
Bursaries, set up to celebrate Olivier's 80th birthday, awarded this year are: