An unreliable history: When Winston Went to War with the Wireless, at the Donmar, reviewed

When Winston Went to War with the Wireless is the clumsy and misleading title of a new play about John Reith’s stewardship of the BBC during the 1926 general strike. Churchill, chancellor at the time, has a minor role as an irascible plodder who makes jokes without a punchline. His role is intended to foreshadow Boris’s career and the characters keep mentioning the gold standard and its damaging effects on Britain’s economy. Gold standard is code for Brexit, of course.

The real subject, John Reith, is played by Stephen Campbell Moore who runs the BBC like a YouTube channel. It’s a solo effort, apparently. Reith writes and presents the news programmes and invites musicians and comic collaborators to play the odd gig. Most of his days are spent fighting off bothersome government wonks who try to censor his output. To add to his woes, he’s haunted by the ghost of a male partner whom he betrayed in a complicated love triangle. But there’s no dramatic connection between Reith’s hassles at the Beeb and his tortured emotional life. What happened to Reith’s gay friend? Did he die in the war? Was he caught out and jailed? We’re not told. Was Reith even bisexual? No idea. You’ll have to research that afterwards because this is a history play that asks questions and never answers them.

Confusions mount up. Reith was 6ft 6in and the script refers frequently to his great height but Campbell Moore is about the size of Tom Cruise. Why not hire a tall actor or drop the reminders that Reith was a giant? It’s unclear why an Asian actor, Ravin J. Ganatra, is playing the Archbishop of Canterbury or what purpose is served by casting Haydn Gwynne as Stanley Baldwin.