In Autumn 1953, Sir John Gielgud, then at the height of his fame as an actor, was arrested in a Chelsea public lavatory. He pleaded guilty the following morning to the charge of persistently importuning men for immoral purposes. Poised to appear in the West End in a play he was directing and recently knighted, his conviction caused a national sensation - breaking the great taboo of public discussion of homosexuality. More than just a dramatisation of a scandalous event in one actor's life, this controversial new play shows how Gielgud's arrest played a small but distinct part in the battle to make homosexuality legal. It captures the spirit of Britain in the early 1950s when judges, politicians and the national press were describing homosexuality as a cancer, an epidemic and a threat to national life. It casts light on the political and social anxieties of the period and the witch-hunting of men who had sex with men. Framed by scenes of contemporary celebration at a civil partnership ceremony and ranging from close encounters in Hyde Park to a Gentlemen's gay club in Piccadilly, from Scotland Yard where pretty policeman were taught how to seduce men in lavatories to the Home Secretary's office in Whitehall, Plague over England offers an extraordinary insight into the dramatic changes in social attitudes to gay life in the last fifty years. Running time 2hours 30mins| 12 Feb 09 to 2 May 09 | Duchess Theatre West End, Greater London Performance Details => Venue archive |
