PATRICK MARMION reviews When Winston Went To War With The Wireless trends now

When Winston Went To War With The Wireless (Donmar Warehouse, London)

Verdict: Reith lecture

Rating: *** 

The BBC has long been in love with its tremendous sense of mission and editorial integrity. 

It goes right back to its founding father, Lord Reith, who is shown in Jack Thorne's new play fighting with Winston Churchill to secure the BBC's future during the General Strike of 1926.

With newspapers not reaching the masses, thanks to the nationwide strikes orchestrated by the TUC, Churchill sought to get his anti-strike message out using a government-published propaganda sheet, the British Gazette. 

What he really wanted, though, was to bring the BBC to heel and exploit its rapidly expanding network of state-of-the-art 'wirelesses'.

Driven by his sense of public service, Reith was determined to resist and preserve the BBC's independence by broadcasting a message sympathetic to the strikers by the Archbishop of Canterbury. 

The only problem was the BBC's funding and Charter of 1927 had yet to be approved by the government. Churchill (then Chancellor) had Reith by the goolies.

The problem with this simplistic idea of Lord Reith (later irritated not to have been made a Knight of the Garter) as a defender of the people, is that it mistakes the BBC's patrician condescension (then and now) for impartiality.

It also involves the actor Stephen Campbell Moore sentimentalising the famously fascist-sympathising Reith as a species of pussycat tormented by his repressed homosexuality. 

In reality, Reith was a war-wounded, 6 ft 6 in, famously truculent and hair-triggered son of a Glaswegian Presbyterian minister.

At one point he asks the archbishop: 'How can we protect the Sabbath from jazz and variety?'

If someone told him his principles would eventually be embodied by Gary Lineker, he might well have pulled the plug.

Even so, we're asked to accept the idea of Reith as a sensitive and nervy man who spoke in strangled vowels and was haunted by his betrayal of his lifelong friend and alleged lover, Charlie Bowser (Reith destroyed their correspondence). 

We are also asked to acknowledge his shame over a supposedly sexless marriage with his wife Muriel (although they did manage to have two children).

But the further idea that a Scottish Presbyterian of any stripe might kneel down to pray submissively with the Archbishop of Canterbury (as Reith does here) is harder to swallow than Creationism. 

Much more fun is Adrian Scarborough's recreation of Churchill as a manipulative, bibulous toad. Any likeness to Boris Johnson is clearly intentional and, as the wearily urbane and headmasterly prime minister Stanley Baldwin, Haydn Gwynne tells him off for over-valuing his sense of humour.

The production by Katy Rudd likewise tries to follow Reith and the BBC's mission to entertain, inform and educate by offering a low-level history lesson. 

Its levity comes from integrating the action with Tom Espiner's Foley sound effects catching the creative energy of the radio in the 1920s.

There are music hall turns between scenes and much fun is had drawing on a scaffold of junk shop odds-and-ends to make sounds.

A trowel and spade are used to demonstrate a sword fight, and a lemon and spoon evoke the gouging of an eye.

So yes, it does entertain, and yes, it informs about the era and the General Strike.

But it's that last bit about the BBC's mission to educate which reveals Thorne's secretly patrician drama as a scarcely impartial Reith Lecture.

Romeo & Juliet (Almeida, London)

Verdict: Timeless tragedy

Rating: ****

The sign-up of Toheeb Jimoh, goal-scoring sweetheart Sam Obisanya from the Apple TV comedy drama Ted Lasso, to tackle

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