The fantastical tale of a little girl who won't - or can't - follow the rules. Confounded by her clashes with the rule-obsessed world around her, Phoebe seeks enlightenment from her unconventional drama teacher, even as her brilliant but anguished mother looks to Phoebe herself for inspiration.

Traveling rainmaker Starbuck arrives at the drought-ridden Curry place, promising rain for the farm and perhaps a romance for 'spinster sister' Lizzie.

A presentation of Tennessee Williams' three one-act plays: "Moony's Kid Don't Cry," "The Last of My Solid Gold Watches," and "This Property Is Condemned."

In 17th-century Tuscany, a church play is performed for the benefit of young aristocrat Cosimo. In the play, a grotesque old woman gives birth to a beautiful baby boy. The child's older sister is quick to exploit the situation, selling blessings from the baby, and even claiming she's the true mother by virgin birth. However, when she attempts to seduce the bishop's son, the Church exacts a terrible revenge.

In The Turning Point, written by Michael Dobbs, Benedict Cumberbatch takes the role of Guy Burgess while Matthew Marsh plays the part of Winston Churchill. The play was part of the Sky Arts Theatre Live! Series, which won the Broadcasting Press Guild Best Multichannel Programme Award.

National Theatre Live’s 2010 broadcast of Alan Bennett’s acclaimed play The Habit of Art, with Richard Griffiths, Alex Jennings, and Frances de la Tour, returns to cinemas as part of the National Theatre's 50th anniversary celebrations. Benjamin Britten, sailing uncomfortably close to the wind with his new opera, Death in Venice, seeks advice from his former collaborator and friend, W H Auden. During this imagined meeting, their first for 25 years, they are observed and interrupted by, amongst others, their future biographer and a young man from the local bus station. Alan Bennett’s play is as much about the theatre as it is about poetry or music. It looks at the unsettling desires of two difficult men, and at the ethics of biography. It reflects on growing old, on creativity and inspiration, and on persisting when all passion’s spent: ultimately, on the habit of art. One of the first five episodes also released on terrestrial TV on a 2009 BBC TV series titled "National Theatre Live".

No description available.

A 2010 broadcast of Hamlet returns to cinemas as part of the NT's 50th anniversary celebrations. Following his celebrated performances at the National Theatre in Burnt by the Sun, The Revenger's Tragedy, Philistines and The Man of Mode, Rory Kinnear plays Hamlet in a dynamic new production of Shakespeare’s complex and profound play about the human condition, directed by Nicholas Hytner. He is joined by Clare Higgins (Gertrude), Patrick Malahide (Claudius), David Calder (Polonius), James Laurenson (Ghost/Player King) and Ruth Negga (Ophelia).

For generations, African men have gathered in barber shops to discuss the world. These are places where the banter can be barbed and the truth is always telling. Follow along as we leap from a barber shop in Peckham to Johannesburg, Harare, Kampala, Lagos and Accra over the course of a single day.

The solo actor in Shimmer tells the story by becoming each character in turn. The play takes place in 1956, in a harsh Midwestern juvenile detention center, where two boys befriend each other.

A hundred and fourteen famous Iranian theater and cinema actresses and a French star: mute spectators at a theatrical representation of Khosrow and Shirin, a Persian poem from the twelfth century, put on stage by Kiarostami. The development of the text -- long a favorite in Persia and the Middle East -- remains invisible to the viewer of the film, the whole story is told by the faces of the women watching the show.

In rural 1840's Scotland, Gavin Dishart arrives to become the new "little minister" of Thrums's Auld Licht church. He meets a mysterious young gypsy girl in the dens and to his horror Babbie draws him into her escape from the soldiers after she incites a Luddite riot. But unknown to Gavin, Babbie is more than she seems. And they must overcome her secret, the villagers' fears of her, and worst of all, Gavin's devotion to his mother's sensibilities, before they can openly declare their love.