Nye

Last night, a friend and I went to see the National Theatre live production of Nye, the story of the man who invented and introduced the NHS. This was my first cinema outing since before the pandemic so I was slightly apprehensive about people in an enclosed space for three hours. The screen we were in could seat 200 people but only six seats were booked. I find that absolutely shocking. A major drama from the National Theatre starring the wonderful Michael Sheen about a man who single-handedly enabled equality of health care free at the point of use, managed to attract six people from this town! I despair.

The opening scene was Aneurin Bevin coming round from an operation to remove a stomach ulcer in one of his NHS hospitals where all the nurses wanted to be his nurse. In pain, he is given morphine, unaware that cancer was discovered which leads to a series of hallucinatory dreams showing his life. The hospital setting morphs into a school where the stammering child is brutalised by a teacher, a library where Nye discovers the power of books and words, the council chamber where he stands up to and overcomes the power of the coal bosses – and so forth.

Michael Sheen acts with both passion and charm, Jenny Lee, his wife, played by Sharon Small, is a powerful figure and intriguing, one of only 5 female MPs when they met. She played her part with confidence. two of the most moving scenes were Nye with his father on his deathbed and his father teaching Nye about coal and mining, the latter having a wondrous mysticism about it.

The later scenes where Nye is fighting for his NHS had so many resonances of today’s politics as we see the NHS being dismantled around us that it left me in tears.

A stylised production which rather oddly at one point pretends to be a musical, I was left with a play which commemorates a giant of a man, erudite, driven, uncompromising but caring. In the end, he did have to compromise to bring the doctors onboard with the NHS. This battle deserved a play of its own.

This was the 100th screening of a National Theatre Live production and there was an interesting film during the interval which detailed not only the gamble they took but also the differences that actors have to be aware of when they simultaneously act for theatre and the big screen. My companion used to be an actress and it was useful to have her insight in this. It also discussed the planning of camera angles etc, things which I had not considered before. Then, to rub it in, it showed audiences across the world, enormous audiences even in China, and I looked around our cinema and inwardly wept. To go to a West End Show, where tickets are a hundred pounds and have the option to see it for 13.95! The atmosphere is not the same, granted, but still a brilliant evening out.

For a full Guardian review, which I probably agree with see here.