Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: David Tennant, Michael Sheen, Georgia Moffett, Lucy Eaton, Anna Lundberg, Simon Evans, Nina Sosanya, Judi Dench, Samuel L. Jackson, Adrian Lester.

To be inspired in difficult and trying times is to accept that the human condition requires stimulating, craves arousal of spirit, and whilst art has undoubtedly suffered without mercy during 2020, there is something of the eternal machine of hope that grinds on, that beats in the heart of every artist of every persuasion, that the show, in whatever format, must go on.

Thanks to modern technology, such a belief is possible, thanks to the advances of global restrictions, such a promise is held dear, but it often takes genius to see the project out from start to finish in a way that offers the viewer, the observer of the absurd truth in illogical times, a chance to remain part of the story whilst adding their own experiences to a script that deals with the world during farcical cosmic times.

Inspiration may come from the soul of the deep and well-meaning muse, but its comic intentions come from a far stranger, and much more deserving place, and in is in the six part comedy, Staged, that the strangeness of our collective experience during 2020 is placed before the mother of the tragic comedy and given reason to experiment with its own possible creation.

A point of acting is interaction with an audience, and if the crowd cannot attend, then the theatrical, in whatever shape and form, must attend to the needs of the masses and the congregation who become starved of the affection fashioned by a withering look, a smile that bares teeth, the cry in the dark which will otherwise become mute, silenced by its own fear. It is this that Staged not only works, but which it transcends the medium, it finds a way to be a force for good in a world devastated by a forced change.

The passion and friendly competitiveness captured between David Tennant and Michael Sheen is glorious, the strength of a friendship bound by a common purpose keenly shaped, and with excellent support from the entire cast, including Georgia Moffett, who arguably doesn’t get the screen time she deserves in other mediums, Nina Sosanya, the sublime Samuel L. Jackson and Adrian Lester, Staged is a performance unlike any other.

Television can go beyond the mundane when its back is against the wall, and Staged is a wonderful example of the power it can exert when the nation needs, demands, reflective beauty. Outrageously, and furiously, brilliant.

Ian D. Hall