Staged review:

Staged (BBC One) is the latest lockdown drama - lockdown dramas being an entire new genre, which Wikipedia will define as "a needs-must 2020 phenomenon in which, under the strictures of coronavirus, a rich person is seen questioning their values, a poor person is seen struggling yet being gamely cheeky, and core workers are celebrated. The genre must feature a Zoom-glitch or similar technological embarrassment." And yet Staged was a hugely refreshing addition to the genre, featuring simply a couple of immensely personable actors playing heightened versions of themselves. David Tennant and Michael Sheen, aided hugely by wives Georgia Tennant and Anna Lundberg, are lockdown-rehearsing an unpalatable, 100-year-old absurdist Italian drama, urged and egged on by Simon Evans, who wrote and directed Staged, and gave himself, in fairness, the very worst lines, the lines which those aged eight to 80 will lift eyebrows to and wonder "Did he really say that? What a dick."

It is grand fun, even if slight, although I suspect that the good friends Sheen and Tennant are, no matter how inadvertently, auditioning even in lockdown for the next series of The Trip.

Staged blog:

Staged stars draw acclaim from viewers and critics

David Tennant and Michael Sheen are being eclipsed in their new comedy... by their glamorous partners.