But the Michael Caine movie has just been remade with Jude

But the Michael Caine movie has just been remade with Jude Law, somewhat implausibly, playing the cockney Don Juan. It’s particularly surprising that those genuinely original film-makers, the Coen Brothers, chose to do the film. Almost as criminal as tampering with The Ladykillers is remaking Alfie. The film, which stars Tom Hanks in the Alec Guinness role, is showing at the Cannes film festival next week. It has already opened in America to extremely poor reviews, which is some sort of blessing.Why remake a classic? It is always more likely to offend and depress than succeed. But that is a word alien to Hollywood, which has imitated it with a remake.

In the West End the conventional methods, with this audience at least, are failing.No one’s laughing in Ealing nowThat classic Ealing comedy The Ladykillers is, of course, inimitable. Personally, I’m not sure I’d see any difference in nuisance value between a box-office clerk and a double-glazing salesman when it comes to cold calling.But as the sold-out notices show, in the East End of London the unconventional choice of show and unconventional method of selling tickets are working. Hedley’s staff do not sell their shows only in the clubs; they get on the phone to past attenders and chat to them, ask them to spread the word among their friends and try to get from them names of people who might be interested in seeing the show.It’s not everyone’s cup of tea. And it would pay, too, to study the unconventional marketing methods of the team in Stratford East. I am a little more hesitant as I fear there is a risk of becoming almost patronising in thinking that certain communities (an iffy concept in itself) will be attracted to the theatre only if the play is about them or their parents.But equally I can see that something new must be tried to change the complexion of Britain’s diminishing audience for theatre Putting on in the West End would be a risk worth taking.

(It’s also, incidentally, the first ska musical, but that’s probably of less sociological significance.)West End producers have never felt confident that they can bring in an Afro-Caribbean audience in the way that Andrew Lloyd Webber brought in a British Asian audience for Bombay Dreams.But, as Hedley has shown, one way of bringing in an audience conspicuous by its absence in theatreland is to stage a show that speaks to the cultural experience of a specific community, or at least the experience of their parents and grandparents This, certainly, is Hedley’s view. But I know that even he was surprised when it was pointed out to him that if this musical transfers to the West End it will be the first show in the commercial sector – musical or straight play – to be about the black British experience. Hedley, a tireless campaigner for the arts, has done much to encourage a more diverse audience to discover theatre. A new musical, The Big Life, about the story of the first West Indian immigrants to Britain has sold out its entire run at the Theatre Royal, Stratford East.
It’s a fitting swansong for Philip Hedley, the artistic director at Stratford, who steps down this year after a quarter of a century at the helm. Something rather remarkable is happening down in Stratford, one of London’s most ethnically mixed and socially deprived areas.