The National Theatre is offering free streaming of its amazing production of 'Nye' until Monday.
This is a play based on the life of Nye Bevan and the birth of the NHS, featuring an amazing performance by Michael Sheen in the title role but with an exceptional supporting cast.
If you need some entertainment this weekend, I strongly recommend it. This is the trailer:
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It is streamed at 7pm on the Youtube channel in the post.
It is pretty flexible as far as I can see
By necessity we watched it in two parts and there appeared to be no time constraint on when you started
I watched this. Quite simply it should be shown at every school. And the National Theatre should do a free special performance for all MP’s . Goodness knows they need reminding who they work for.
I can certainly recommend it – very well produced, moving and thought provoking.
The theatre performance I attended got a (justified, I thought) standing ovation.
Thank you Richard – that’s my afternoon sorted out.
A tour de force of both playwright and actor.
The refrain? “I’m scared.”
But he did it regardless because it was the human thing to do. There are too few in life who will do that “anyway”, and we are all the poorer for it.
Watch it: it will live with you forever.
Agreed
Thank you for letting us know about this, Richard. I have just finished watching it. However, I don’t think ‘entertainment’ was quite the right word, as I ended up in tears. Also immense gratitude for the creation of the NHS and determination not to see it downgraded.
Worth it though….
It was indeed excellent and very powerful.
I saw it in the cinema as part of NT live – it even got a standing ovation there!
That’s also where I first saw it
Well worth seeing again
Highly recommended, having seen it live.
Brilliant! (Just got to interval).
I wonder how many of the cabinet will watch it? Perhaps we could ask them for their thoughts?
(Starmer wouldn’t let Nye keep the whip, in today’s party.)
Thank you, Richard. I have sent friends the link too 🙂
I must be very thick, but – try as I might – I can’t work out how to see this. All I can get with the link is the trailer. But how to see the film (for free) ?
Search YouTube for Nye and it should come up
Nut maybe not in France…..
@anrigaut this link it takes you directly to the film:
https://youtu.be/hpN–d5bXSY?si=VSzEVF0UW4_7PxfC
My late mother was very proud that she used to go walking their dogs together in the countryside in Sussex with Nye Bevan. She was a teenager staying at her father’s house in Slaugham and Nye used to stay with Russell Strauss and his wife Ann who lived opposite, in the same village.
She always told us how he asked her whether she agreed with the idea of a National Health Service and appeared to really value her young person’s thoughts.
She was waiting to turn 18 so she could take her place in the WAAF where she was a met officer, charting conditions for the RAF missions. She was very supportive of my campaign efforts to try to save the NHS from the big fragmentation and selloff that is happening now, disastrously.
Great story
Thank you
And listening to people is key
It is why I read the comments here
I could just post them, but this would then be a very different blog
I cannot do the same on YouTube
We must start to comment on your YouTube reports, if we’re able.
Youy can…
Richard, the NHS is a most wonderful institution and how grateful I am to Nye that it was created, however, the cost of running it in the days it was created was so much less than these days as medical science has so advanced that no matter how much the organisation is streamlined, greater efficiencies made, and more preventative medicine happens I wonder how the NHS can be paid for and remain free at point of entry for everyone.
I would love you to write an article and/or make a video to understand how this might be feasible.
In a sesne I have – the answer is all in controlling ultra-processed food. At ;east ione tho0rd of the cost of the NHS is now spent on managing its consequences.
But, I note your request.
Absolutely agree! But in 1948 there were no heart, lung, liver transplants, cancer drugs, scanners etc and even by preventing a lot of illness due to bad diet and lifestyle these are so expensive and to allow decent health care for all how can we afford it, and social care for the ever increasing aging population? (Sorry not wanting to make my question too wide).
All noted…
Richard our NHS campaign group has spoken about spending some of our funds on education – possibly creating a video or better still to get a team to do ‘Health and Self’ nutrition sessions in schools.
These need to be done from primary school but also secondary schools, to show pupils the cost of raw ingredients and how easy it is to create good, easy nutritious dishes and to lower the risks to health.
It should really be being done by the Integrated Care Boards – which are the 42 regional Boards that have replace the single National Health Service.
The deliberate rationing of funds to these Boards is designed to continue the fragmentation of the NHS in preparation for privatisation and the introduction of a two tier system such as the USA suffers.
This revealing article shows how this was all started by Andrew Lansley and enabled by the Coalition of Conservative and Liberal Democrats.
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/ournhs/former-health-secretary-andrew-lansley-s-diaries-finally-released-in-nearly-full/
Good luck
It would need to be good to work
Rosie, also this country is a wealthy country – was the fifth richest on the globe when I started NHS campaigning. People earn a lot more comparatively than they did when the NHS was formed.
The cost of NOT doing those operations is a lot more. They are also comparatively cheap. In 1948 people used to be kept in bed, being nursed, for weeks – even for a toenail operation.
Women died regulatly in childbirth, they don’t now. People’s economic lives have been hugely increased.
If you remove the excesses of the grotesque profits made by pharmaceutical companies, and at least tax those who are using our infrastructure to make billions but not contributing, we can afford it.
If you stop handing the profitable parts of the NHS to companies expecting decent returns for shareholders – all money from the Exchequer and earned using NHS trained staff and often NHS-owned buildings (as in my town where an Australian company is doing most of the orthopaedic operations which bare very little risk but lots of money in a brand new building paid for by the NHS), you invest in maintaining buildings, and you give staff reasonable pay to stop them leaving our shores for better pay and conditions in the New World countries, then we can definitely afford to keep the NHS buoyant.
All these things have been betrayed in 14 years of ‘efficiencies’ by a party that has never believed in the NHS but dares not say so because it is such a national and international treasure.
As I said, we cannot afford not to. More of the current privatisation, coupled with the false Labour premise by the returning NHS privatiser, Alan Milburn, that ‘the NHS is broken’ (it is not) and it will be beyond saving.
And that will leave you all – all those who have lost the faith and trust – in a system where you either have to pay the US corporations to get your treatment on time, or you will be left with an ailing, starved NHS that could have continued to give an equitable service to everyone.
Thank you
Appreciated
Roseanne, thank you for your response. I think it so important that it be promoted that the NHS can be run well without any privatisation – I am really against this – but unless there is a positive campaign spelling out how this can be done this looks like it will happen, hence why I asked Richard if it is possible, and to write something.
Can I assure you it is possible?
But give me time
Hi Roseanne, do you have a website to sign up to your campaign newsletter? I’d love to know what you’re doing 🙂
Hi Rosie,
Our website is here http://keepthehortongeneral.org/
However this is very much about our activities. There is a much wider view on what is being done to the NHS on our Facebook page, of the same name. https://www.facebook.com/groups/314494598963926
You will find a lot more information about the national picture on Keep Our NHS Public, run by very senior campaigners supported by doctors, nurses and consultants, which gets to the real nitty gritty of the politics. https://keepournhspublic.com/
Morale is incredibly low in the NHS. While staff are battling beyond their capabilities, managers are protecting the political destruction of the health service. It’s a disaster.
Thanks Richard – finally got it and have watched to the interval and paused for now, hoping to be able to continue later as you did.
Remarkable & moving.
Excellent…
It’s available until tomorrow
Re: How can we pay for the NHS? Richard, I can’t comment directly under our conversation for some reason, so replying further down.
Gratifying you believe it is possible. I hope you can write or vlog something and convince many politicians it is not only saveable but could be healthy! Thanks
Thank you for the link, Richard. Wouldn’t have watched it without your prompting and thought it absolutely brilliant.
Thank you for link, I watched first half last night, been away. There are various groups doing a great job pushing to save NHS from privatisation and fragmentation, Everydoctor is a good one, working currently to get MPs to come to virtual presentations/meetings. They are aware of Richard Murphy explaining how the financial side could be fixed.
I like working with them.
Clearly a brilliant play and great to be able to watch a streamed performance at home. But maybe it’s just my local conditions but it was unwatchable due to constant advertising breaks – half or a whole minute, every 5 minutes. Sorry but maybe I need to have a paid subscription to something… But thanks for telling us all!
Sorry
I admit I pay YouTube to avoid these as I use it so much.
Thanks Roseanne Edwards, for the links re supporting the NHS and Keep Our NHS Public. I will have a good look at what’s being done. Good luck in your endeavours. Keep up the good fight!