I saw the swanky new production of Twelfth Night by the excellent people at the Donmar Warehouse as part of their West End season.  Oooh, he's a talented lad, that Michael Grandage, I must say.

Shakespeare (sorry to shock you) usually bores the socks off me onstage because it becomes, after a time (and with actors who are merely okay) like watching a foreign film without subtitles.  But when it's well done, as in Twelfth Night, it's actually rather good, isn't it?  A brisk, sunny, very funny two and a half hours, with Derek Jacobi ACTING his way through Malvolio.

Where I think they make an error.  Jacobi is so good as Malvolio, you begin to rather like him, and his humiliation isn't the laugh-fest it's meant to be.  I felt he was wronged, and at the end, when he vows revenge, it felt like something was left undone rather than the last grandiosity of a pompous ass.  An miscalculation, I think.  But worth seeing, definitely.  Good luck getting a ticket, though.

As for the rather remarkable news that Alexandra's version of Hallelujah looks to be Christmas number one and Jeff Buckley's Hallelujah is going to end up Christmas number two, can I just say how irritating those smug Jeff Buckley fans are?  Just because you're pretty and you die young doesn't make you an untouchable saint.  I prefer Rufus' version anyway and am more than happy that Leonard is going make a packetful.